After a moment, Laurent said, ‘Everyone to the south, but only half the people to the north.’
He was staring at Damen. He had clasped the forearm that Damen had extended to him, and used it to lever himself up, dripping.
Around them, there was no sound but the rushing of the stream, and a slight rattle of river stones; Laurent’s gelding, who with a massive push of its hindquarters had heaved itself up minutes ago, saddle askew, was now moving a few paces off favouring its left foreleg ominously.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Laurent. Then he said, ‘We can’t leave him here.’
/> He wasn’t talking about the horse.
Damen said, ‘I’ll do it.’
When it was finished, he walked out of the undergrowth and found a place to clean his sword.
‘We have to go,’ was all he said when he returned to Laurent. ‘They will notice when he doesn’t report back.’
* * *
It meant sharing a horse.
Laurent’s gelding had a limp, which Laurent, on one knee, drawing a steady hand down its lower leg until it pulled its hoof up sharply, pronounced a sprained ligament. It could follow on a lead carrying the packs, he said. It couldn’t carry a rider. Damen brought his own horse over, then paused.
‘My proportions are better suited to riding pillion than yours are,’ said Laurent. ‘Mount. I will mount behind.’
So Damen swung into the saddle. A moment later he felt Laurent’s hand on his thigh. Laurent’s toe nudged into the stirrup. Laurent pushed up behind him, shifting until he was snug in position. His hips fitted unselfconsciously to Damen’s. Once he had settled, he clasped his arms around Damen’s midsection. Damen knew this about riding pillion: closer, it was easier on the horse.
He heard Laurent’s voice from behind him, a little more oddly strapped-down than usual, ‘You have me over the back of your horse.’
‘It’s not like you to give up the reins,’ Damen couldn’t help saying.
‘Well, I can’t see the way over your shoulders.’
‘We could try some other arrangement.’
‘You’re right: it should be me in front and you carrying the horse.’
Damen closed his eyes briefly, then spurred the horse forward. He was aware of Laurent behind him, damp, which could not be comfortable. They were lucky to be in riding leathers rather than armour, or they would not be able to do this easily, jabbing and poking into one another. The horse’s rolling gait pushed their bodies together in constant rhythm.
They had to follow the stream to hide their tracks. It would be an hour perhaps before it was noticed that the outrider was missing. Another interval before they found the man’s horse. They would not find the man. There were no tracks to follow and no obvious place to start searching. They would decide: was a search worthwhile, or should they keep on their way? Where to search and what for? That decision would also take time.
Even riding double with a pack horse, evasion was therefore possible, although it was pushing them far out of their way. Damen took them up out of the stream bed several hours later, where the thick undergrowth would mask their passing.
By dusk they knew that they did not have an Akielon army following them, and slowed. Damen said: ‘If we stop here, we can build a fire without too much fear of discovery.’
‘Here, then,’ said Laurent.
Laurent saw to the horses. Damen saw to the fire. Damen was aware that Laurent was taking more time with the horses than was necessary or usual. He ignored it. He built the fire. He cleared the earth, gathered fallen branches and broke them down to the correct size. And then sat down beside it and said nothing.
He would never know what had provoked that man to attack. Maybe he’d been thinking of the safety of his troop. Maybe whatever he had lived through at Tarasis or Breteau had stirred violence in him. Maybe he had just wanted to steal the horse.
A third-rate soldier from a provincial troop; he would not have expected to meet his Prince, a commander of armies, and face him in a fight.
It was a long time before Laurent brought the packs over and began to strip out of his wet clothes. He hung his jacket on an overhanging branch, toed off his boots, and even partially unlaced his shirt and pants, loosening everything. Then he sat on one of the rolls from the packs, close enough to the fire to dry the rest of himself—trailing laces, dishabille, and steaming lightly. His hands were lightly clasped before him.
‘I thought killing was easy for you,’ said Laurent. His voice was rather quiet. ‘I thought you did it without thinking.’
‘I’m a soldier,’ said Damen, ‘and I have been for a long time. I’ve killed on the sawdust. I’ve killed in battle. Is that what you mean by easy?’
‘You know it isn’t,’ said Laurent, in that same quiet voice.