Had Bors sent him, somehow, to rescue me? Or was he loyal to King Rowan and ready to save my life? The punch he’d delivered had been hard, but then it would have to be if he was trying to make out that I was dead.
“It’s over,” he said over his shoulder. “Must have caught her just right.”
There was a moment of hesitation. “We’ll take the body to the south entrance, dump her in the sea.”
“I’ll do it. You get back to the watch. Last thing we need is anyone starting to ask where we are.”
“The queen said—”
“Do you really think I’m going to make a mistake with this? Queen Beatrice would have my head. No, leave it with me. Trust me, nobody will find the body.”
I tried to keep still as the moments passed, then heard the door shut, and the guard helped me to my feet, guiding me to the very chair where the queen had been sitting.
“Thank you,” I said as he unfastened my gag, my hands trembling as I searched his face for any sign of who he might be. I was barely able to trust that he wasn’t trying to poison me as he poured me a glass of water, then a goblet of wine, removed my bindings and motioned for me to drink.
“You must be thirsty,” he said, and his voice sounded concerned. Kind, even.
But as I drank, he caressed my hair, then my cheek, and my collarbone, in such a way that I knew exactly what he wanted. There could be no mistake.
“I’ve always wondered what’s so special about royal women,” he said. There was something unnerving about the way he spoke, the hush of his voice, the feel of his touch on my skin. “I’ve always had a theory that royal pussy is especially tight.” He twirled my hair around his finger as I turned my face away. “I suppose you wouldn’t know. So I’ll have to investigate for myself. I’ve always wanted to fuck a royal…”
“Please,” I begged, searching for anything nearby that I could use to defend myself.
“Cooperate with me, behave like a good little bitch, and I’ll kill you quick when it’s over.” Now he slid his dirty hand down my chest, toward the hollow between my breasts. “But fight me, and I promise that you’ll die in pure agony.”
Agony or no, the thought of his hands on me was unacceptable. I shoved him away from me. “I belong to only one man,” I snarled. “And it isn’t you.”
He seized me by the hair, and I shrieked with pain. Then he pushed me down on the table and tried to pull my skirt up while also shoving down his britches. But I had not spent the last eighteen years doing needlepoint while wearing too-small corsets; I was strong and I knew it.
And so, with every ounce of strength I had, I fought him. I kicked him and bit him and dug my fingers into his eyes. Everything and anything I could do to defend myself, I did. We battled across the room and I finally got the upper hand, shoving his head through one of the wooden lattice screens.
The window was narrow and the broken lattice was sharp and uncomfortable around his head, but I knew it wouldn’t hold him for long. I realized I was going to have to take his life to save mine. As much as that thought repulsed me, I knew it might be my only chance at freedom and I had to take it.
And so, without one more instant of hesitation, I grabbed his dagger from the sheath on his calf and drove it sideways into his neck, grateful that I didn’t have to look at his face as he died.
Bors
I hustled up the wide, cobblestone street that led to the front of the castle, steeling myself for any trouble that might come my way. Above me, I heard a commotion and looked up, drawing my knife as I did in case I should need to defend myself. But I was not prepared for what happened next. A man’s head protruded from a window, soft warm light surrounding him.
He hollered and tried to work himself free from the narrow opening but before he got the chance, someone stabbed him through the neck. The effort of the stab was accompanied by a roar, the noise of someone in the heat of battle, spilling blood to save their own. And I would have known the sound of that voice anywhere.
Sara.
Holy fuck, it was Sara. I felt her fear run through me as she screamed.
“Stay where you are,” I yelled up at her. “I’m coming to find you!”
“Bors!” She screamed in reply, her voice trembling with fear but tinged with hope at my arrival. “Help me!”
“I’m coming. I won’t let anything happen to you.”