“I knocked her out so that she wouldn’t get hurt!” Amarande answered, scooping up the dagger he aimed to grab and flinging it straight toward the man. It caught him precisely as she’d hoped—piercing not his skin, but the extra fabric of his tunic, pinning him straight into the wooden wall of the inn’s main building.
Out of the corner of her eye, the princess saw her next move.
If Amarande were someone else, she might have left Taillefer to fend for himself while she pried the resistance’s location from this man’s lips. She’d warned the prince not to expect a rescue, after all. But—as much as she hated Taillefer, she’d thrown in her lot with him, and, without his distraction a minute ago, she likely would’ve been injured or worse.
Satisfied the man was securely detained by the pinned dagger, the princess collected his wife’s sword and her own dagger and raced towardthe prince—who was still struggling with the wolf, the woman, and the man who’d given chase.
They were toward the center of the yard, fumbling in the dirt close to where it faded from stark ochre to sun-bleached white. As Amarande got closer, she saw the man on the ground with a stab wound to the leg, slightly apart from where the woman loomed over Taillefer with a sword an inch from his sternum, the black wolf grinning at her side.
“So much for that famed Ardenian fighting talent,” the woman taunted.
Blood mottled the front of Taillefer’s Itspi uniform, dripping from his mouth, purple bruises already forming against his temple and jaw. Cloak holding on by a thread and the uniform shredded by the wolf’s teeth and claws, Taillefer lay warily on his back, eyes fixed on the woman and wolf. His sword had been kicked away, toward the blotch of frost-white sand.
For once, he didn’t say a word.
Hoping to provide a distraction before the woman or wolf closed the distance with blade or teeth, Amarande pleaded her case yet again. “We are pro-Otxoa and looking to connect with the resistance!”
The woman didn’t budge. Behind her, the injured man laughed so hard he coughed, wet and gasping. “Princess Amarande and her guard, pro-Otxoa? That is the most ludicrous thing I have ever heard.”
Taillefer finally regained his voice, holding out a hand as he tried to get his feet out from under him and stand. “You are mistaken. This is not the princess. My uniform is stolen, and we hail—”
Whatever lie he’d fabricated died away as the woman spit out a command.
The black wolf leapt straight for Taillefer’s throat.
Teeth bared, spittle flying, fur arched along his spine. Its paws connected with Taillefer’s chest and shoved him to the ground. He struggled to push away the animal’s jaws as the whole of the wolf’s weight was on him now, the snarling beast holding all the leverage.
Amarande cursed and sprinted at them but she was too far away, and the woman and her blade were ready, blocking them. She had two choices—fight the woman and hope to make it to Taillefer in time, or sling her boot knife at their writhing, entwined forms and hope to hit fur instead of skin.
But then, as the woman came so close into view Amarande could see her teeth ground together, sword held high, the princess realized she had a third option.
Without the slightest hesitation, Amarande barreled at the woman full-speed, sword out. The woman’s stance stiffened, her eyes squinting over her gritted jaw, bracing for impact.
Three. Two. One.
At the very last second, Amarande dodged and slid. Sword flung wide to avoid cutting the woman off at the legs, the princess let the sandy earth and her momentum do the work for her as she skidded past the waiting woman and straight at the combined mass of the prince and black wolf.
Past the reach of the woman’s blade, Amarande veered into the fray, her only aim to be a human-sized blunt object. Her knees and boots connected with the animal’s side body, giving Taillefer just the momentum he needed to push the wolf away. The combined thrust sent the animal flopping onto its side with a mournful yowl.
It skidded away in a plume of cinnamon dust all the way to the edge of the flat white sand.
“That… appeared… to be… a… rescue,” Taillefer bit out, rolling onto all fours in a heaving attempt to right himself.
“Not over yet.” Amarande coughed and stood, sword out in a single-handed grip of her uninjured hand, up as protection from the woman, who was still there with a blade and a vengeance.
Yet in that moment, the woman dropped her sword altogether and rushed forward.
Past Amarande. Past Taillefer.
The princess and prince whirled around, to see only the black wolf’s snout and ears visible—the rest of it swallowed into the white sand where it had landed in the tussle. It had been swallowed in mere seconds. Slurped down as easily as sagardoa, straight into the earth.
Behind them, the injured man screamed. “NO! Rena, no!”
The princess and prince watched in amazement as the woman threw herself down to the sand in a swirl of muslin and dust. She was on her belly, thrusting desperate arms into the sludgy sand, boot heels digging into the terra-cotta earth for purchase.
Amarande gasped, remembering the Innkeeper’s words from her first visit.
The compost. Fed by a hot spring. Scorching enough to boil you alive. Spit you back out, dead meat, whether by suffocation or poaching, it mattered not.
