Queen of the North (Book 3) (Songs of the Scorpion) (27 page)

“You call what happened to us an accident?” Fira snapped.

Jathen came within an arm’s length of them. Up close, the monk’s face showed even greater ravaging. Some scars suited men. Those he wore would do nothing to turn a woman’s eye, except away in pity. “A poor choice of words. Forgive me. Attempted
assassination
, it seems, was done here. Well, I’ve come to deliver the king’s justice.”

“I didn’t know the Iron Marches had a king,” Nesaea said, not liking the way he was looking at her.

“More’s the pity they don’t. Ah, well, I suppose it’s up to the justice of Skalos.”

Before Nesaea guessed what was coming, Jathen’s face twisted into a bitter sneer, and he caught a handful of her frozen hair. He yanked her head sharply to the side and leaned in close. His eyes were cold and bleak.

Fira lashed out, but one of the Kingsguard who had come with Jathen stepped in and dragged her away. Jathen barely paid them any notice.

He leaned closer toward Nesaea, turned his face one way, then the other. When he spoke, his breath was a warm puff of steam across her face. “Have a good look.”

“Did you suffer an accident?” Nesaea asked breathlessly, still twisting at the hilt of her dagger. She thought it had budged a fraction.

Jathen wrenched at her hair, forcing her head farther to the side and dragging her off balance. “
Accident?
You cannot be serious?” With each word, he twisted harder, until Nesaea’s neck gave an alarming crack. The only way to relieve the pain was to drop to her knees. The relief was short-lived. He shook her like a dog worrying a rat. She abandoned her dagger to claw at his stones. Before she could reach him, he struck her across the mouth. A dull ringing filled her skull, and blood washed over her tongue.

“Leave her be!” Fira screamed, sounding far away.

The
Lamprey’s
crew began shouting against the abuse, but the ring of Kingsguard tightened. When Liamas tried to push through, a spear butt slammed into his belly, knocking him back.

“You name
mutilating
me an
accident
?” Jathen’s fury raised his voice into a shriek.

“I’m sorry,” Nesaea said, searching in vain for a way to break free.

“Oh,
milady
, you have no understanding of the word!” Jathen raved.

Fira twisted in her captor’s grasp and raked her nails across his eyes. He cursed as she spun out of his hands. Before she could take the first step, his fist collided with the back of her neck. Fira staggered and fell, hitting the frozen rocks with a muffled sob.

“Fira!” Nesaea screamed, at the same time Jathen bellowed, “Enough, you fool! She’s mine!”

Stunned silence held for a moment, then Ostre and his crew attacked. Fists flew, spears swung, men fell. In seconds, the rebellion was over. Liamas and Ostre both lay on the ground, bleeding and dazed. At least one crewman was dead, the loops of his innards hung in rigid fingers. The Kingsguard forced the rest of the rebellious captives to their knees.

“Don’t mind them,” Jathen said against Nesaea’s ear. “You have problems of your own.”

“Kill me and have done with it,” Nesaea said, jaw clenching.

“Why ever would I foreshorten our time together, when I have so many questions that need answering?”

At the nasty tone of his voice, Nesaea’s hand stole once more to the hilt of her dagger. It was like trying to drag a boulder from the earth.

Jathen’s fingers twined tighter in her hair. “Whenever I look at my face, you see, I wonder what recompense such a grievous wound demands. Now I look at you, and wonder, what would such a pretty young woman cherish most about herself. What, I ask, is that
one
thing you could lose that would make you understand my pain?”

Nesaea stared into his eyes and saw something worse than death looking back.

Jathen pressed closer and gave a brutal squeeze to one of her breasts, while at the same time speaking in reasoned tone. “Perhaps, I think, cutting off your teats would be proper payment for what you did to me. But then, I think, perhaps not, for you could hide such wounds from the world, unlike me—lest I wear a mask.” His gaze mapped her features. “I tell myself I could take your eyes, maybe your lips. Or, perhaps, one of each? I expect there are those who would find such ravaged beauty appealing, even delightful. At worst, you could combine such
imperfections
with your other talents to great advantage in some lord’s great hall or king’s court.”

Nesaea tried again to pry his fingers free of her hair. He smiled, gave her cheek a jarring slap, then pressed his lips against her ear. “I’ve thought of many ways to punish you … but only one
truly
suffices.”

Jathen leaned away and motioned to one of the Kingsguard. The soldier approached, looking at Nesaea with something between regret and lecherous hunger. “Shame to ruin her, monk.”

“And it is an even greater shame that you insist on providing opinions when none are required! Now, give me your torch.”

Nesaea went cold, and her efforts to get loose intensified, when the torch passed hands. As the heat of that fire drew near, she smelled her wet hair struggling to burn, and she began to scream.

Chapter 23

The agonized scream rose so sharply and so loudly that, for a moment, Rathe believed the forest itself was suffering some rending agony.

A moment later, the cry cut off.

“Hold,” he ordered, ducking behind a screen of brambles. The abrupt movement revived the pounding in his head, but for once, it was easy to ignore.

Loro hunkered at his back, a hulking shape in the night. “Could’ve been a frost leopard,” he said in a hopeful tone.

“Such a beast would have to be very hungry to stalk men with fire.” Rathe wiped a trickle of blood from his brow.

“Then it was a woman,” Loro said, his voice cracking with rage. “Far as we know, there are only two nearby.”

“It was Nesaea,” Rathe said hollowly.

Loro’s silence told that he thought the same.

Rathe struggled to think beyond the hammering inside his skull, and his skin crawled at the memory of that piercing cry. The guilt he felt was worse. Since fleeing into the forest—he hated to think of it that way, but fleeing was exactly what they had done—all they had managed to do was stay out of sight, work their blades loose from their scabbards, and warm their limbs a bit by darting between the shadows.

“We have to go back,” Rathe said.

“We’ll die,” Loro said. “You understand that?”

“Yes,” Rathe said, but secretly reasoned that King Nabar had not sent a small fleet loaded with Kingsguard to capture Rathe’s companions, but him alone.

“All men die, but I never thought this would be my end,” Loro said. “I’d hoped to pass in my sleep, with a full belly, and a wench or three curled beside me.” His scowl had deepened as he spoke, but now his face went slack and he loosed a grudging sigh. “Well, there’s no help for it. Let’s get on with this mad business.”

Not long after they turned back, Rathe saw scores of torches through the trees.
At least there hasn’t been any more screams
. That brought him no comfort.

“Are you sure two men against a legion is the best course?” Loro asked. “Maybe we should have a look around, find a place to sneak into their camp, and wait for the guards to get sleepy.”

Rathe shook his head. “With the snow falling, they’ll soon load the prisoners onto the ships and put them to the question.”

Loro cursed under his breath.

Rathe parted a drooping curtain of snowy branches. The dam of rocks that had crushed the
Lamprey
was now a waterfall, the edges already beginning to freeze. The galleys rode anchor where the River Sedge widened below Ruan Breach. So many lamps burned on their decks that Rathe could have mistaken the fleet for a floating city. Most of the crewmen stood at the rails to look toward the riverbank, which was now lined with beached longboats, and easily two hundred Kingsguard. Edrik and his fellows stood apart from the other captives, passive but watchful. The
Lamprey’s
crew knelt on the riverbank, most of them bloody. Rathe picked out Liamas, Captain Ostre, and a redheaded woman—Fira, no doubt. She was bent protectively over someone on the ground. As he didn’t see her anywhere else, Rathe guessed Fira was watching over Nesaea.

“Seems you were right about Nesaea, brother,” Loro said, voice thick. “But I’d judge she’s alive.”

Rathe was unable to speak.

“Someone needs to die for this,” Loro said, shifting his feet. “Sooner the better.”

Rathe nodded, but didn’t move. Someone
would
pay, but as he would have only a single chance to collect his due, he wanted to make sure he chose wisely.

That was when he saw a man arguing with a trio of Kingsguard. The fellow wore a familiar green cloak. Melting snow had darkened his blond curls and plastered them to his skull. Rathe knew him well. “Brother Jathen. I suppose he wanted to see me collected.”

As they watched, the three men of the Kingsguard caught Brother Jathen and half led, half dragged him to one of the longboats. None to gently, they tossed him in. The crewmen at the oars shoved off and began rowing toward the ships.

“Seems he angered someone,” Rathe said, but he was looking again at Fira, who now cradled Nesaea’s head in her lap.
She would not take such care if Nesaea was
—Rathe’s mind skittered away from the word dead.

Loro’s attention had turned to another longboat approaching the riverbank. He whistled softly. “Looks like the king and his new queen have also come.”

Rathe looked that way, startled. Even with the falling snow, he knew the man’s face. The last he had seen Nabar, he had been sitting beside his father at a tournament in Onareth. Then, Nabar had been a timid and rather weak prince. He still looked so, but now he was the King of Cerrikoth. His queen was a mystery concealed beneath a light blue veil that matched her thick cloak.

“I know what to do,” Loro said.

Rathe arched a questioning brow.

“I hand you over to the king, collect the reward, and save my arse and everyone else’s in the bargain—all except yours, of course. But then, you’ll need to worry more about where your head ends up, than your arse.”

“Not a bad idea.” More or less, that had been Rathe’s line of thought.

Loro snorted. “That’s naught but a steaming pile of horseshit, brother. I didn’t gather up the Maidens of the Lyre and attack Fortress Hilan to get you free, nor did I cross the Gyntors and venture into the madness of Ravenhold, only to hand you over so easily.”

Rathe had once known another man who had stood by his side with the same conviction. Thushar had died in chains, his head lopped off because of Rathe’s indiscretions.

“I thank you, but you’ve earned a better end than what I face.”

“Save all that valiant twaddle for gullible children,” Loro growled. “My woman is yonder with yours, and even if I didn’t want to, that forces me to stand with you to get her loose.”

Rathe could have argued further, but saw that Loro had made his decision. He prayed to Ahnok for strength and courage, even as he cursed the demonic spirit that so relished bringing him, and everyone around him, no end of misery. “Luck to you, friend.”

“Same to you, brother.”

Weapons poised, they stood up and pushed through the brambles.

Chapter 24

“Why hasn’t it worked yet?” Danlin asked Edrik in a low voice, his gaze searching the faces of the crimson-cloaked soldiers around them. To Edrik’s eyes, Danlin looked every inch as fierce as they did, but after seeing the ease with which they put down the crew of the
Lamprey
, he knew they were men born to war, where he and Danlin were inexperienced priests trapped in a monstrous and foreign world filled with merciless
deycath
.

“Be patient,” Edrik said, his confident tone belying the obviousness that nothing had happened since they drank the Blood of Life. Like Danlin, he wondered at the delay—a delay that had allowed the vile mistreatment of Nesaea, now sprawled senseless. After watching Rathe and his companions in Iceford, Edrik felt as if he had come to know them a little, at least enough to share in their misery. Watching the pale-haired warrior in the green cloak—General Jathen, another soldier had named him—abuse Nesaea as he had, made Edrik’s belly cramp.
What sort of people can do such terrible things?

On the heels of that thought, a small voice asked,
What right have you to judge anyone?
It was you who dropped a cliff on the
Lamprey
. You had no care for her safety then
.

Thin as it seemed, Edrik’s answer was that he had acted to save Targas, not some diabolical need or desire to see a woman suffer. Besides, he reasoned, if Nesaea had died aboard the
Lamprey
, it would have been a mercy, compared to what she had suffered at Jathen’s hands.