“Wait, General, and let someone help you. Is the boy badly injured?”
“I-I don’t know, Your Highness; I don’t think so. He just passed out, but he was only released from the infirmary this morning. He was barely recovered from the stabbing.”
“Yes, Kirstos, I know. But you need to sit down and let someone else take him. You’re looking pale and shaky yourself—that was a really close call you all survived, and the adrenalin is probably leaving your body too quickly. Please, sit down before you fall.”
“I’m all right, Your Highness.”
“I know,” he replied, in a soothing voice I’d rarely heard from him. I needed to tell him I was fine, but still he had his arm around me and was guiding me to the broad steps at the front of the palace and urging me to sit down. Several of my guards began to surround me and one of them took Taran out of my arms, telling me when I objected that they would take him straight to the infirmary for me. Another one was offering me water and urging me to slow down my breathing. That one sat beside me and took my pulse. I realized after a moment that it was Lt. Worron, the medic who had treated Taran during the attack. I did as he asked, since the prince was watching me carefully, but I felt impatient to go inside and check on Taran.
And Janos too—I wanted to make sure that Consort Janos hadn’t been hurt by the way I’d thrown him so desperately to my soldiers. I must have said it out loud, because Mikos said, “Janos is fine. You saved his life and his son’s life. The family is grateful for your service and strength, General. Now rest here a moment and I’ll leave you in Lt. Worron’s hands while I go investigate this collapse of the bridge. The timing is too coincidental for my liking.” He glanced up at the sky and then back over at Worron. “Better get him back inside soon, Lieutenant. The storm seems to be starting up again.”
I choked back the automatic protest that came to my lips, because I realized that I did feel shaky and exhausted. It was a display of weakness I didn’t like. But the sky was growing darker and darker, as the wind picked up, and the rain was flying into my face with each gust. The wind was so strong it tore the words right out of our mouths.
I drank the water Worron gave me and swallowed down the pills he forced on me too, and I began to feel stronger. Worron insisted on helping me to my feet and walking me inside, though I tried to shake him off. It wasn’t a second too soon, either, because as we closed the door behind us, the storm hitin earnest, flinging wind and hail at the windows and door and howling around the palace walls, as if trying to entice us to come outside and fight it.
‘I’d like to go check on Taran.”
“Give it a few minutes, sir. He’s in good hands downstairs in the infirmary, and I believe his parents just went down to be with him.”
I nodded. “Do they know yet what caused the bridge to collapse?”
Worron shook his head. “Not yet, sir. King Stefan wants a closer look at the wreckage from what I heard, and he’s sent some of his men down to see what they can find out. Though in this storm, and the way that river in the valley below is flooding… Anyway, we should know more soon, unless all the evidence gets washed away. The river is pretty turbulent, and it will be hard for King Stefan’s people to retrieve anything valuable to an investigation, I’m afraid.”
“Yes, I think so too. It all happened so suddenly. There was a loud cracking sound and then the far side of the bridge began to pull away from its moorings. I really thought we’d all die on that bridge.”
A loud rumbling of thunder shook the walls, and I must have been more badly shaken than I thought, because I felt a tremor run all through me. When I was a child and trembled that way, my human omak used to say the strangest thing—“someone must be walking over your grave.”
I’d always thought it was such an odd thing to say, but then he’d said a lot of weird human expressions, and he’d left us when my brothers and I were living off planet at our training school. My father never even told us he was gone until we returned home for a holiday and found him gone. He hadn’t even left us a note. We’d noticed all the arguing they did, but we never thought he would leave us. Especially without even saying goodbye.When my younger brother cried, my father had shouted at him to never show weakness. He had been nine years old at the time, and I’d been eleven. Later that night, when I heard him whimpering softly again in his bed, I went over and crawled in next to him and held him until he went to sleep.
Strange, but I hadn’t thought about that period of my life in years. I never found out if Omak left us of his own free will or not. I had eventually shaken off the sadness, though it took a long time. Our father had told us such feelings were unsuitable for the warriors we wanted to become.
When my father had died only a few years later, after being grievously wounded in a skirmish with Alliance rebels on one of the moons of Lycanus, he had been lost in fever dreams, racked with pain and infection, and the only person he kept calling out for, over and over again, had been my omak.
“I’d like to go down and check on the Consort Janos and Taran now. Are they both in the infirmary?”
“I believe so, sir,” Worron said.
“You can go back to your duties now, Lieutenant. Thank you for your concern, but I’m feeling much better now.”
He snapped off a salute and went back outside. I watched him have to force the door open against the strong wind trying to strong-arm its way inside. I had to wonder about the shuttle that had been coming to meet us, and whether or not it had been caught in some of these winds on the way down to the surface of the planet. If it had, it would have been disastrous. I wondered too, who had told King Stefan that it was safe for us to leave and try to make it back up to our ship in the first place.
I made my way to the infirmary, only to be informed that Prince Larz had been by with his consort and his son, but after a brief exam and consultation with the doctors, they had decided to go to their own rooms to rest and recover. Neither Janos nor Taran had sustained any real injuries, other than a few bruises,though both were suffering from mild shock symptoms. They wanted to check me over too, since I was there, but I refused and assured them I’d rest in my room for a while as well. That seemed to satisfy them, and though I thought about going back outside to see if I could help, I thought of the look that was likely to appear on Prince Mikos’s face if I did and quickly changed my mind. I decided to take everyone’s advice for a change and went up to my room instead.
Chapter Twelve
Taran
The servants brought me up some toasted bread and some of the hot Lycan tea they all seemed to love around here, and I drank it all down to try and get rid of the shivers that kept running all over me. I took a hot bath as well, and that helped even more. I wrapped myself in one of the huge towels they’d kindly left in my bathroom and then lay across the bed, “just to rest my eyes.” I woke up what must have been a few hours later, feeling more energized.
I found myself wondering where the general was, and what he might be doing. I knew that Janos and Larz were fine and resting in their room—they had ever only really needed each other. And the minute I thought that, the very idea seemed traitorous, because they had saved me, and they had always been there for me since they took me in. Yet I had always known that I wasn’t trulynecessary and vital to their happiness. They had each other for that.
Or maybe I was feeling a little lonely and sorry for myself. I needed to shake it off and figure out who it was that was trying to kill me—or maybe members of my family, with little concern for collateral damage. I found it hard to believe that the collapse of the bridge had only been some kind of accident. I remembered, in fact, that Prince Vannos had told Janos and me that after his marriage, he had talked the king into updating and widening the bridge. So the bridge wasn’t nearly as ancient as this castle, and when they’d widened it, surely it had been reinforced and made safer—that was only logical. What had made it suddenlycollapse? Had it been weakened by the violence of the storm? How did that happen?
I suddenly wanted desperately to see and talk to General Vargarra and get his opinion. Though if I were being truthful, it wasn’t only his opinion that I wanted. Without hesitating to think it through, I pulled on a big, white robe I found hanging on the back of the bathroom door, eased out of my room and went barefoot down to the other end of the hall. I knocked softly on his door, not wanting to wake him if he was sleeping, and it occurred to me that I had no idea what time it even was. I was in luck though, and after only a few seconds, the door opened and the general stood there in front of me, looking even more handsome than usual. He was still wearing his uniform trousers, though he’d removed his shirt and boots. His naked chest was broad and muscular and the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.
I followed the line of his body down to his well-shaped, high-arched feet. I found them almost unbearably sexy. I spoke softly, so I wouldn’t disturb anyone who might be close by in their rooms, “I’m sorry to bother you, sir. But I just wanted to say I owe you my thanks. Thank you for saving my life and Janos’s life because I think…I know… that if it hadn’t been for you, we’d both be dead.”
He was standing there, looking so tall and impossibly handsome and he shook his head. “No, Taran, you don’t owe me anything. I was only doing my job. Trying to keep you safe.”
