The Falcon in the Barn (Book 4 Forest at the Edge series) (40 page)

“
That’s right, we do!”
Perrin growled at him. “This could be considered insubordination,
and we weren’t finished—”

“
Yes, we were,” Shem said
dismissively. “More importantly, we need to talk about what
happened last night. About
you
.”

He led a fuming Perrin to the edge of the
woods where the first wagons were pulling up in the large open
area, the camp well behind them on the other side of the command
tent.

Shem murmured, “I know something happened
with you. I saw it in your eyes when you came back last night. You
also haven’t slept enough, and—”

Being hen-pecked by Shem was the last thing
Perrin wanted. “Shem, I’m fine. And where are we going?” he added
in annoyance.

A wagon rolled to a stop in front of them,
and he stiffened when he saw the “extra help.”

No,
this
was the last thing Perrin
wanted.

Mahrree climbed off the side without waiting
for assistance from the soldier who brought her. Jaytsy and Peto
jumped out the back and stood by the wagon with eager, but
apologetic, faces.

“
Ah, Shem!” Perrin snarled.
“What’s she doing here?”

Mahrree marched up to him. “Don’t ‘Ah, Shem’
him! This was my idea. You went out there, didn’t you?”

Perrin was furious.

At least, that’s what the emotion felt like.
His wife, checking up on him as if he were a twelve-year-old
runaway. How absurd.

But there she stood, hands on hips, and her
eyes severe as she gazed into his. Until she softened.
“Perrin?”

He wasn’t sure what she saw in his face, but
the urge to grab her throat and check her pulse overwhelmed him. He
took her wrist instead and dragged her past the edge of the forest
into the shadows for some privacy. Her pulse quickened under his
fingers as he sat her down on a fallen tree.

Shem followed them in—apparently this morning
no one remembered Pere Shin’s first rule about staying out of the
forests—and waited for the Shins from a little ways off.

“
Yes, I went there,” Perrin
confessed. “But I didn’t get hurt.”

“
Mahrree, if it makes you
feel any better, he was pretty good out there,” Shem
offered.

“
So you were, Shem,” Perrin
said. “I’m actually more worried about you. Last night you were
very effective, for once. More than once, by my count.”

Shem looked down at a lone pinecone. “I know.
I had no choice. I’m working on that myself.”

Perrin took a deep breath. “Well, add that to
the list of things we’re going to discuss later. We have enough to
talk about for riding all the way to Waves. Now, I promise both of
you that I had no problems during the battle.”

Mahrree looked deep into his eyes. “But
after?”

Perrin couldn’t hold her gaze any longer. He
sat down in the dirt in front of her and stared at a decaying log.
There were no more images, but just the memory of the images. Of
smoldering. Of Mahrree.

“
Shem,” he whispered, “we
can’t let them use that weapon.”

Perrin felt his wife’s arms wrap around him.
“Weapon? Tell me what—”

“
No!” he exclaimed, pulling
out of her embrace. He’d never tell her, especially here among the
rotting wood that reminded him of burning limbs. “I never want to
see it again!” He dared to meet her eyes, and searched himself as
she searched his face. He didn’t feel the same as before. He
was
beating it, right there.

“
I can deal with it,” he
assured them, “because Shem’s going to destroy whatever
remains.”

Mahrree turned expectantly to Shem.

He nodded back to her.

Perrin took Mahrree’s face. “You shouldn’t
have come here.”

“
But you need us,” she
said. “The children and I can help get the injured to the
wagons.”

“
How long were you planning
this?”

“
Ever since you told me
what you were planning.”

“
Women don’t belong out
here.”

“
Prove it.”

He managed a short chuckle. “I don’t have
time to debate you right now, woman.”

“
No you don’t,” she agreed,
“But do you have a few seconds to accept my apology for checking up
on you?” She put her arms around his neck again and kissed
him.

Of course he had to be polite and return the
gesture, ardently . . .

Shem groaned and turned around.

“
No, Peto,” he called
loudly. “Stay at the wagon. Trust me.” He murmured to himself as he
ambled out of the trees. “Yes, yes, advantages of marriage—you
remind all the time . . .”

---

Mahrree and the children proved to be more
help than Perrin imagined they could be. While the surgeons and
assistants attended to the more seriously injured, his family
handled the minor cuts and the changing of bandages. He was
surprised that wounded men responded so cheerfully to his wife and
son. Seeing another face besides a sour surgeon’s seemed to be an
effective treatment.

But he was not at all surprised by the
attention afforded his daughter. Soldiers who were barely injured
suddenly needed Jaytsy to rewrap a wound that had just been bound
by an aide, or required her arm around their waists to walk them to
a departing wagon even though they had wandered over to the surgery
area on their own.

Perrin tried to stay nearby to shoot warning
glares at the young men who happened to be lucky enough to have the
beautiful—yes, Perrin had to acknowledge she’d become uncomfortably
stunning—young woman notice their “need.”

Soldiers from other forts who somehow missed
the fact that her dark eyes, nearly black hair, and confident gait
were identical to the colonel’s were usually enlightened by Edge’s
men, although a few were allowed to naively try to sweet talk her,
just to see what kind of punishment the colonel hovering behind
would impose on the hapless soldier. It was usually their ranked
yelled loudly in their face, followed by the words, “Would you like
me
to get
a little bit closer
to check your
wound?”

Perrin tried to steer Jaytsy—who seemed
innocent to the differences between smiling and leering—away from
where Thorne was waiting to be loaded onto a wagon, but she
happened upon him by accident when Perrin was distracted elsewhere.
Too late Perrin turned to watch from several wagons away as Jaytsy
adjusted the bandages on a soldier whose face she only glanced at
with a practiced smile. One of the surgeons had asked her to rewrap
the oozing wound three litters away, and her attention was focused
on the blood, not the bleeder. Without his undershirt and jacket,
and splattered with dirt and dried blood, Captain Thorne was not
immediately recognizable to Jaytsy.

Until he put a hand gently on her arm.

She looked up with the same comforting smile
she gave all the soldiers, but then her face froze and the smile
dissolved.

Perrin took a quick step forward but decided
instead to observe from the distance. He could make it to her side
with his fist ready in less than two seconds, and he rather hoped
for the opportunity. He hadn’t spoken to Jaytsy about what happened
between her and Thorne a few weeks ago—he needed her to keep her
confidence in Shem—and now he wanted to see her reaction to
Lemuel.

He had a clear view of his daughter’s eyes
when she recognized Thorne. They bulged in anger. But she bit her
lip and went back to fixing his wound, albeit more
aggressively.

Perrin beamed when Thorne flinched as Jaytsy
tightened the bandage around his ribs.

But Lemuel still held her arm and squeezed it
gently. She paused in her straining to
really
tighten that
knot, and shifted her hardened gaze to his face. He said something
quietly and Perrin’s hand balled into a ready fist.

Jaytsy’s face remained wooden, but she nodded
slightly and went back to securing his bandages that would likely
require a knife to remove. She stood, glanced briefly in the
direction of her father without fully seeing him, then turned to
help the next soldier as Thorne’s litter was hefted into the
wagon.

It would be hours until Shem returned to find
out for Perrin what transpired between the two of them. At least
seething over Thorne holding his daughter’s arm, especially since
he told him just over three weeks ago to
never
touch her
again, gave Perrin something else to think about instead of the
burning at Moorland.

Chapter 16
~
“Who gives gifts like THIS?”

A
s the horses
lurched to take the wagon back to Edge, Mahrree turned around one
last time on the bench.

Perrin waved again and gave her a look that
said,
Trust me
. He promised he would be home for dinner
tomorrow, and that she didn’t need to come check up on him
again.

She felt a little guilty about seeing him
this morning, but her relief that he was fine outweighed the guilt.
She knew he wouldn’t have been able to stay within his confinement.
The smell of action would be too strong, and he’d violate any
decree to do what he thought was right.

But before Mahrree and the children left,
Perrin pulled her aside to the empty command tent.

“
To be honest, I’m a bit
concerned about how all of this may be interpreted. Although we
were successful, once word of this reaches Idumea—well, Mahrree,
how would you feel being married to a forty-four-year-old
lieutenant?”

She gripped his muscled bicep. “You still
feel the same to me.”

He’d startled her by stealing a quick kiss
and whispering, “I love you,” before he escorted her to the
wagon.

She glanced down behind her at the three
wounded soldiers resting in the bed of the wagon. The most
seriously injured had been sent back hours ago. These three had
mostly superficial wounds, but they couldn’t walk or ride well.
Perrin insisted on sending his family home with this last wagon of
injured. He didn’t want them going home with the dead, and he
received no argument about that from his wife.

Peto sat in the wagon bed chatting with a
corporal who had a wounded leg. The soldier used to live in Idumea
and had watched the champion kickball team. The young men talked
about plays and strategies and people Mahrree didn’t know, but it
didn’t matter. Peto was happy.

She had just turned back around when she
heard Peto say, “When we move to Idumea, I’m going to try out for
one of the teams.”

Mahrree gulped, even though her mouth had
gone dry. She subtly leaned back to eavesdrop on the rest of the
conversation.

“
When do you think you’re
going?” the soldier asked Peto.

“
Soon as they make him
general. I guess I can wait a couple of years, though. I need to
improve my defensive game.”

“
I heard it’ll be a lot
sooner than that. Some were saying last night he’s definitely going
to be promoted now, because of what happened.”

“
Yes!” Peto exclaimed.
“Perfect!”

Mahrree fought down a worried whimper,
reminding herself that corporals didn’t decide transfers and
promotions, and glanced to her side to see if Jaytsy had heard.

But Jaytsy’s mouth was moving as if she were
carrying on a conversation with herself. She stared intently ahead,
oblivious to everything else.

Mahrree had been waiting for an opening to
talk to her. She’d seen Jaytsy tending to Lemuel Thorne before he
was brought back to the fort, and while Mahrree had no real reason
to not trust him—except that he was the son of Versula Thorne—for
some reason she just didn’t
like
the young captain. He had
looked at Jaytsy with an earnestness that Jaytsy didn’t return. At
least, not yet.

Mahrree prayed silently again.
Dear
Creator, I know it’s not as if there is one perfect man out there
for her, but could there be some other options sent her way so
Lemuel isn’t her only choice?

Mahrree glanced around again. On the bench
before her, the driver of the wagon was busy in conversation with
his relief driver; behind her, Peto was exchanging more strange
words related to kickball with the soldier, and the two other
injured soldiers were snoring quietly in the bed of the wagon
despite its jostling. Mahrree assumed they must have been exhausted
or sedated. Her daughter was trapped by her side for the next hour.
Good as time as any.

Mahrree patted Jaytsy on the leg. “Doing all
right? Quite a day.”

“
What?” Jaytsy blurted, as
if Mahrree had just pulled her out of some faraway thought. “Oh,
I’m fine. Yes.”

Mahrree tried again. “I was quite pleased
with how well you did. The sight of all that blood and the burns .
. . a few times I had to go take a break. Some of those men really
took a beating, didn’t they?”

“
Yes, I suppose. It wasn’t
that bad, really. All of them seemed to be smiling.”

Mahrree chuckled. “Smiling at you!”

Jaytsy rolled her Perrin-brown eyes, but then
turned to her mother. “You really think so?”

“
Of course! What wounded
man wouldn’t be thrilled to have a beautiful girl fawning over
him?”

Jaytsy faced forward again, her long ponytail
cascading over her shoulder where she caught it and fretfully
fingered the braid. “I don’t know. Sometimes it just seems there
aren’t any right men in the world. Plenty of men, but not the
right
ones, you know?”

“
Right one for
you?”

Jaytsy nodded. “I mean, I know I need to
seriously consider what’s before me, but—”