Chosen (The Warrior Chronicles, 1) (18 page)

“Your evasive conversational techniques need work. However, I will answer, since it is still on track with my questioning. I was asked to survey a few bodies before they were incinerated. Some did not look like the Mugdock, and a great many had no obvious signs of death. Add that to a pair of glowing violet eyes and a fainting woman, and you have need of a doctor’s opinion.”

“And what is your expert diagnosis based on this folklore?”

“Well, that you are impossible to work with and the Captain will have to sort you out because I cannot.”

“Defeatist.” Shanti smirked.

“Yes, it would seem. Now,
lie back, because I can see that you are suffering merely to prove a point—point proven, decidedly—and get some rest. You will need it when the Captain gets around to visiting. He is not as…patient as I.”

Shanti la
y back with a grimace. It would hurt less to be dead.

As the doctor moved to leave, she thought back to what he said. Cayan would be bursting through in an awful temper
any time, she had no doubt. The question was, why was she so apprehensive?

“Sanders, with me.”

Sanders internally cringed. The hard gravel in that voice slid along his bones and pounded at his nerves. The Captain had not been in a great mood since he returned bloody and wild from the middle of a horde of Mugdock with a limp woman in his arms. Since then everyone had been afraid to be in his sights, especially his commanders.

It was three days after the battle.
Daniels and Sterling were leaning against the wall in front of the pyre, watching as the last of the smoldering bodies were transferred into a huge pit.

“Yes, my
liege,” Sanders said meekly, stepping in behind the long stride.

They walked back into the city where every person they met gave some signal of thanks to the Captain.
Enlisted men gave a salute. Civilian men gave a nod so deep it was almost a bow. The civilian women looked at him with love-sick eyes.

T
he Captain was heading toward the hospital.
Oh no.

Pan
ic started to crawl up Sanders’ spine. He looked in earnest for an escape, for a reason he had to be somewhere else. He almost wished they were being attacked again. It was the last meeting in the world he wanted to attend.
Anyone
wanted to attend.

They walked in through the door. More nods. More smiles and sparkling eyes. More salutes. A few uncontrollable grunt
s that Sanders let slip. If these idle bodies loitering in the halls could read his mind, they would realize those low guttural noises he couldn’t help were actually calls for aid. Why was no one helping him? Did they not see where he was headed? And with whom?

Instead of turning right at the crossroads, though, they went straight ahead.
Down a large white corridor. They were going to the badly injured ward.

Sanders gave a huge sigh of relief.

The Captain stopped in front of a closed door and paused. After a deep breath Sanders probably wasn’t supposed to notice, he knocked quietly before stepping inside. He motioned Sanders in after him.

Sanders stepped into the sterilized space and immediately winced. It was a well-known fac
t that fighting men of Sanders’ caliber did not enjoy that overly clean lemon smell of the hospital ward. If you smelled it, you were either attending the sick or dying, or one of them. All bad things.

Lucius was in his bed lying flat on his back, no color in his face. He had a bandage around his head, white squares of gauze around his neck, and a mending broken nose. Sanders was sure there were more bandages beneath the sheet.

“Captain, Commander Sanders,” Lucius said by way of greeting. His voice was shaky and weak. Being that the man had been near death when he was brought in, the fact that he was conscious and talking was a great stride.

“Lieutenant.” Sanders gave a stiff nod. “Good to see you are on the mend.”

“Yes, sir.”

The Captain took a chair from the corner and pulled it close to Lucius’ head. “I thank you for your valor, Lieutenant.
I would’ve hated to lose you.”

Lucius and the Captain had grown up together. It was said that the Captain trusted no one in the world as much as he trusted this childhood friend.
And that was a nice sentiment, but why did Sanders need to sit in on this? He didn’t want to see any of the Captain’s vulnerability. That wasn’t what men did. That should be saved for the wives.

“However, I was under the impression you were given strict orders to take the foreign woman to the hold?”
the Captain went on.

Oh. That’s why. So
mehow this, too, was Sanders’ fault. Great.

“I was, sir.” Lucius didn’t low
er his eyes. “She did not want to go.”

“Often women do not want to do what is in their best interest. It is why we have to subtly help them see reason.”

“My approach was subtle, at first, sir. Then, when she punched me, it was less so. Finally I had no choice but to follow her lead.”

The Captain paused before saying,
“I am to understand you followed her lead willingly, Lieutenant. Directly to the front line. In front of a well-put-together group of trained, battle-hardened men.”

“Yes, sir. They were also inclined to follow her lead. She has a way about her, sir.”

The Captain stared at Lucius for a tense moment. The other man tried to hold the gaze, but inevitably, as they all did, dropped his gaze to the floor.

“She would have been captured.” The Captain had a hard edge to his voice. Sanders took a step toward the door.

“Yes, sir,” Lucius said weakly.

“She’s a woman. I’
m sure you can imagine what would’ve happened had she been captured?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Is that a fate you would want for your mother, Lieutenant? Or your sister?”

“No, sir. But in my defense, I wouldn’t have been able to stop her, sir. I tried to fight beside her and keep her safe. It was all I could do.”

After another minute of hard staring, the Captain lowered his head. Then stood. “She is a hard case. Sanders has yet to maintain control over her. Being that he is of higher rank, I can hardly expect you to fare any better. I had hoped, but I see that was in vain.”

“I would like to stay on her detail, sir,” Lucius stated with a high chin.

“You are compromised, Lieutenant.” The Captain spoke simply.

“She’
ll trust me now, sir. She doesn’t want followers, she wants men-at-arms beside her.”

The Captain stopped
as he headed for the door, his back to his old friend. Lucius took that as a cue to keep going. “She entertains when someone raises an objection to her schemes. She’ll hear my complaints and advice. She’ll defer to me if I can convince her.”

The room got thick and sluggish. Sanders tried to push himself against the wall, not wanting any part of this conversation. Any movement might draw notice. He wanted Lucius to get the post so he wouldn’t have to take it.

Finally the bands that made breathing laborious released and the Captain nodded. “Very well. When you are better, we’ll see how it goes.”

“Yes, sir.”

Out in the hallway the Captain said in conversational tones, “Lucius just did you a favor.”

“I caught that, sir. He’
s a better man for it.”

“Yes, he’
s always had a heavy dose of courage.”

Sanders cleared his throat.
“I saw her fight, sir. He wouldn’t have been able to force her to the hold. Not with his life.”

“I know that. I still wanted him to try. Battle is no place for a woman. Not when she will become a prize.”

“I don’t think she was planning to stay alive long enough to be a prize.”

“For that reason, also.”

They turned a corner and started down the recovery corridor, stopping in front of a wooden door. The Captain knocked twice then immediately stepped back when the door opened. The doctor stepped out, realized who it was, and closed the door behind him.

“You’ve picked a fine time to call on her,” the doctor drawled. “She is out of bed and
staggering around the room. Apparently that’s her way of saying she’s miraculously healed after only three days.”

“And how is she faring?”
the Captain asked, not put off by the dry delivery.

“Oh, how wonderful. Someone
who actually wants her real diagnosis. Two ribs are broken. She is unconcerned about those. Three toes are broken. She concedes that the Mugdock are heavy. There are muscle pulls and strains all over her body. She also helped me do my job by noting her gift is strained, whatever that means.

“Oh, and she has learned a new swear word. It starts with “c”, is predominately used on women in an extremely derogatory way
. She thinks it is hilarious. Watch yourself.”

The doctor walked away with a rigid back. Sanders had the feeling the c-word was no longer solely used on women. He couldn’t help but smil
e. Until he saw the murder in the Captain’s eyes. It sufficiently ruined his mood again.

As the doctor had said, Shanti was standing. Laboriously, but standing. She was leaning against the wall looking out the window, her gaze on the distant trees. Her body looked like an abstract painting, splotched with a myriad of colors, mainly blue, yellow, purple, and red. Between her injuries, her skin was the same translucent white he’d noticed when she was near death in the dead forest. Unlike then, he noticed she had a much better form than when she’d been carried in a few short weeks ago. Her muscle was sinewy and graceful. She was taking on the shape of a woman again, hips and breasts and—

Sanders turned away, which he probably should have done immediately after realizing the piece of fabric on the floor next to the door, as if thrown at a retreating figure, was her nightgown. He had seen many a naked man, being that there was not much privacy in the field, but he’d only seen naked women when he was about to—

Shanti turned at the uncomfortable groan.

“Clothes, please,” the Captain said easily, leaning against the
far wall. If he was troubled by the perfect form of the naked woman—

Sanders groaned again, squeezing his eyes shut. He was not strong enough for this.

Shanti gave the Captain an irritated stare. “The fabric gets in the way of sleeping.”

“You aren’t sleeping. Put it on.”

“No.”

“You’
re causing an awkward situation between Sanders and Junice at present. It’s not very nice.”

Shanti glanced at Sanders and sighed. “Why is this nation so worried about nudity?”

“Humor us.”

As she crossed the room, moving like a panther, she picked up the fabric and slid it over her head. Sanders tried desperately not to memorize the look of billowing gray material flowing over perky, well-formed breasts. He also tried not to watch the cloth as it made its way—

The room filled with the sound of a head repeatedly banging against the door.

“I have no funnies,
so I don’t need an audience,” she said, returning to the window.

“Jokes,
” the Captain supplied. He seemed to find her black mood entertaining.

“I want out of this room
.” Shanti’s eyes focused on the trees.

“You’
re not healed.”

“I’m healed
enough to leave this room.”  

“Where would you go?”

“The park.”

“Then?”

Shanti was quiet. She was no longer welcome at Sanders’ house. A foreign naked woman fighting with the also naked man of the house in the middle of the night was not something wives got over. Or forgot about. Shanti understood that.

“It’s time for you to tell me who you are,” the Captain
asserted, taking a chair.

Sanders preferred to stand. He was still uncomfortably tight in his groin.

“Is your wife okay?” Shanti asked suddenly, turning to face the Captain. Her eyes flicked to Sanders. “And Junice? Is she okay? And your
bairn
?”

“Our barn?” Sanders asked in confusion.

“Child. Baby. Little ‘un.
Bairn.”

“How did you…”

The Captain’s eyes swiveled to Sanders with a question. Sanders answered them both. “She’s fine. They are both okay, as far as the doctor can tell.”

The Captain nodded in a congratulatory sort of way. Shanti turned her gaze back to the Captain. “And your family? Did they get to safety in time?”

Sanders was still confused. Surely she knew the Captain had lost his parents—or else why would he be Captain?

“Unfortunately, I have no fami
ly to speak of.” The Captain’s tone was matter-of-fact, but Sanders could see a little of the leftover vulnerability from the conversation with Lucius. Sanders shifted uncomfortably as the Captain went on—being in this room was worse than the last. “If you are asking about Tanicia, she’s okay, as is her family, as far as I’ve heard. There were no civilian casualties.”