The trek on the donkeys was taking far longer than the one Lia and I had made to Terravin on our Ravians, but in my condition, riding fast and hard wasn’t an option anyway. “It’s not much farther,” I told Gwyneth when we stopped to water the donkeys. “Just another two days.”
Gwyneth brushed her thick red locks from her face, and her eyes narrowed, looking down the road still ahead of us. “Yes, I know,” she said absently.
“How would you know? You’ve been to Civica?”
She snapped back to attention, tugging on Dieci’s reins. “Just a guess,” she said. “I think you should let me speak with the Chancellor when we get there. I might have more power of persuasion than you.”
“The Chancellor hates Lia. He’d be the last person to speak to.”
She tilted her head to the side and shrugged. “We’ll see.”
CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX
RAFE
“Bite down!” I commanded.
We couldn’t afford for him to scream out, not with the way sound echoed through these rocky hills. I shoved a leather strap between his teeth. Sweat poured down his forehead and dotted his upper lip.
“Hurry,” I said.
Tavish shoved the needle into Sven’s cheek and pulled the bloody gut through the other side of the wound that ran from his cheekbone to his jaw. It was too long and too gaping to leave to a poultice. I held Sven’s arms in
case he flinched, but he remained still—only his eyelids fluttered.
We had encountered a patrol of Vendans. The barbarians were becoming bolder and more organized. I had never seen a Vendan patrol numbering more than a handful this far out from the Great River. There were plenty of small rogue bands of three or four, fierce and violent—that was their way—but not an organized and uniformed patrol. It didn’t bode well for any of the kingdoms.
The treacherous Great River had always been our ally. A thin chain drawbridge that could barely support a single horse was their only way across. Were they breeding horses on this side of the river now? The patrol we encountered had fine, well-trained mounts.
We took them all down, but not before Sven suffered the first blow. He was riding ahead of us and was knocked from his horse before I could even draw my sword, but then I moved swiftly, taking down his attacker and three more who followed behind him. In minutes, the Vendans littered the ground at our feet, a dozen in all. Jeb’s face was still spattered in blood, and I could feel the crusted smears on mine.
Orrin brought over Sven’s flask of red-eye as Tavish had ordered. I removed the leather strap clenched between Sven’s teeth and gave him a sip to help numb the pain.
“No,” Tavish said. “It’s for his face—to clean the wound.”
Sven started to protest, and I shoved the strap back into his mouth. He would rather suffer infection than see his precious spirits spilling from his cheek to the ground. Tavish shoved the needle in one last time and closed off the wound. Sven groaned, and when Tavish poured the strong draft over the sewn gash, his whole body shuddered with pain.
He spit the strap out. “Damn you,” he said weakly.
“You’re welcome,” Tavish answered.
We were two miles from the Great River on the only path that led into the Vendan kingdom. We’d been hunkered down in a rocky encampment that faced west, the direction we knew they’d be coming from. It was at a juncture above the route where they’d have to pass, but we’d been here for two days now with no sign of them. They couldn’t have beaten us here. We had ridden until both we and our horses were at the point of collapse. Today we only left our position to scout out a better vantage point farther from the border, but we ran into the patrol. After throwing their bodies into a ravine, we took their horses with us and hoped they weren’t expected to return anytime soon.
Tavish put his needle away and surveyed his handiwork. He patted Sven’s shoulder. “Trust me. It’s an improvement.”
“I should have let him go first then,” Sven said weakly gesturing to me.
“You’ll be fine, old man,” I answered, knowing he hated that moniker. I hadn’t even realized how deftly Sven always positioned himself just ahead of me. I wouldn’t let him do that again.
He and the others slept while I took first watch. We didn’t expect to encounter a patrol up here in the rocks, but then we hadn’t expected to encounter one down below either. The barbarians were lawless unpredictable sorts, with little regard for any life, even their own. I had seen this trying to flush out rogue bands while on patrol. They charged you with violent wild cries and crazed eyes, even in the face of forces they couldn’t hope to overcome. Death over capture was always their choice. I hadn’t pegged Kaden as one of them. I had known there was something about him I didn’t trust, but I never would have guessed he was a barbarian.
And he was with her now.
I scanned the black western horizon where only the stars drew its line.
“I will find you, Lia,” I whispered.
In the farthest corner, I will find you.