Exile. Part 3

"Where-," she breathed.

Crack! Something snapped in the distance.

"Don't speak," his lips whispered in her ear as his arms wrapped around her. He strained to listen. Footsteps. Then a new waft of burning fabric. He could feel Aurelia shudder as a second swath of flames lit the sky, and he wanted nothing more than to protect her from witnessing the hatred unfolding before them.

With the caution of the hunted, he eased her deeper into the spruce trunks and draping branches. Movement was vital but terrifying. Every snapped twig, brushed branch, or uneven footfall amplified in Robert's ears. Without a moon, he had no choice but to use the violent glow of the fires as his directional guide.

We have to reach those horses. If daylight came, and she was still here, any tracker worth his salt would follow the path from the second burned tent. Even Robert could have done it, but he could not disguise the tracks on his own. Not at night in an unknown environment with the princess at his side. He needed his mount, and he and Aurelia had to reach water. Follow it far enough to lose anyone hunting them. And then?

In Tyralt's name, where can I take her?

He thrust the question away and tried to focus on the present. They must have reached the southern edge of their camp. The orange glow had shifted.

Whose orders were behind that deadly light? Or rather, whose were not?

Her sister, her stepmother, even her father had a motive after his eldest daughter's threat to reveal the truth about the a.s.sa.s.sination plot. Aurelia's words from the last day at the palace came back to Robert. You, she had said, are the only person I can trust.

Only now did he realize the shattering truth behind that statement.

At his side, Aurelia staggered, wrenching him from the shadows of his thoughts. Instinctively he reached for her arm. She pulled back, but his hand came away sticky. With blood. He froze, then broke his own moratorium on speech. "You're bleeding."

"It's a scratch," came her hushed words of explanation.

He tried to believe her. There was nothing he could do if the injury was severe.

Again Horizon screamed, and a chill ran through Robert's body. Why was the stallion still distraught? The orange glow was fading now, not growing stronger.

Just get her there, Robert told himself.

The glow had changed position again. They must be close.

Horizon's next call confirmed the thought. Though still high-pitched, the sound was a whistle of recognition.

Robert swept his gaze over the trees. His eyes were used to the dark now, but the tangle of branches made it almost impossible to tell what lay in front of him.

The horse, though, did not need to see in order to sense his rider's approach. Thrashing hooves pounded nearby, and as Robert crept toward the sound, Aurelia at his back, a tail swished into view.

The furious stallion had wrenched his rope high up along the tree trunk to which it was tied and was kicking not only air and ground but the trunk as well.

Waving at Aurelia to stay back, Robert moved swiftly to place his hand on the horse's side. The dangerous hooves pounded once more against the trunk, then dropped to the earth. They pawed the ground, and the stallion swung his head. Robert ducked as a pair of equine teeth snapped in his direction. Horizon's entire body quivered.

"Shh," Robert whispered as he edged toward the halter rope. "You know it's me."

His fingers found the knot. Tight. Impossibly tight. He s.n.a.t.c.hed the knife from his pack and, in seconds, cut the rope.

The stallion broke free- To reveal the mare behind him: Bianca, her body flat upon her side, a horrid slit at the base of her throat, blood emptied onto the ground.

Robert whirled toward Aurelia, but he was too late. She had seen her mare, and opened her own mouth to scream.

Chapter Four.

SURVIVAL.

AURELIA'S CHEST RIPPED APART AT THE SIGHT OF Bianca. Her friend. Her confidant. The loyal, trusting mare who had given love with no expectation save her rider's own heart.

Now broken. Aurelia wanted to scream and scream, but she could not because Robert had m.u.f.fled her mouth against his chest with the demand that she not make any noise.

Then the world fragmented.

Terror defined the flight from the blood. Darkness, pain, and the piercing cold of drenching mist. Grasping tree limbs that tore at her and threatened to thrust her from the stallion's back or rip her to pieces in the attempt. Then icy sheets of black creek water that seemed to wind forever beneath Horizon. And always the scalding flames that had stabbed their way beneath her skin, threading through the corridors of her mind, obliterating thought, hope, and reason until the only thing keeping her moving was the constant pressure....

A hand on her back. A grip around her waist. A pull, push, or tug.

The thin line between nightmare and reality had blurred within her. There were visions: her sister injecting venom through fingernails at Aurelia's throat, the guards turning her own charred body on a spit, Bianca's neck gushing and gushing and gushing blood. Another death. One more life on her conscience. Who else would have to die as the cost for her friendship?

Him.

She tried to push away the thought, but it dripped down into the crevices of her sanity.

"Aurelia?"

She was stiff, like solid stone.

"Aurelia?" There was an urgency in the voice now. What gave him the right to talk?

Pressure on her shoulder. She jerked awake ... to a gray, impenetrable mist. The tree limbs of nightmare surrounded her, now in sober stillness, their needles weighted down with the morning's oppression. A black horsetail swished between two solemn tree trunks, then vanished in the vaporous shroud. The underbrush held back, keeping a subtle distance, but Robert, kneeling beside her on the hard ground, lacked the same common sense.

She did not want him here. Did not want him to witness her in this shattered state.

His hand reached for her wrist.

She jerked away, her shoulders burning as the wool blanket slid down past the red scratches marring her skin. Her sleeves hung in tatters, and she shuddered.

Concern etched the lines of Robert's face. "Are you all right?"

The flames within her head escaped, a white orange wreath forming around the nearest tree trunk, then licking its way up the scaly bark. Burning. She could not speak.

Robert pressed a canteen into her hand. She swallowed the cold water, trying to douse the fire. It smoldered, leaving her in shivers.

The concern on Robert's face deepened. He lifted the blanket back to her shoulders, setting off fresh pain. "I'm sorry we can't light a campfire this morning."

Because the guards might see it.

"Maybe tonight after we've covered more ground," he added. "I've been thinking, and I believe we should keep heading north."

Which way was north? She had never felt so lost.

"We can't go back to Sterling," Robert continued. "The guards will expect it, and there's too much open ground."

Open ground. As if she were prey to be hunted. The smoldering tree trunk began to burn again.

"And we can't take the Northern Road to Transcontina as planned. They could spread out along it."

Lying in wait at every village. She was prey.

"We will have to forge our own path through the forest, though it is really too dense for decent riding." His gaze shot to the scratches on her skin. "There's food in the pack."

Not enough. The careful way he had said it made that much clear. His hand clenched the hilt of his sword, then let go as he continued, "I don't have my rifle, but I can fish and set snares, or maybe make a bow. ..."

Her mind was falling farther and farther behind the trail of words. The flames were once more scaling the nearby tree trunk. She knew he could not see them. Only she could see them.

Oblivious to the smoke writhing around his ankles, he crouched down over an array of items spread out on the ground beside the open pack.

She squinted through the haze, trying to identify the objects.

Something round and black. With writing. A compa.s.s.

String.

Folded parchment.

A handful of silver. Some of it battered.

Rope. She did not linger there. It conjured darker images.

Hooks with sharp spikes.

A knife. Blood spilling from Bianca's throat.

Flint and steel.

I can not scream.

Another drink. The flames subsided, ash drifting down.

Pressure on her hand. Robert was still talking. "I know it's not much, but ..." She lost the thread of his voice as she stared at what he had given her. Red. Dark. Not blood. Dried berries. She raised them to her tongue and swallowed.

He slid the knife into his boot, packed away all of the items except for the compa.s.s, and disappeared into the smoke. She wanted to stop him, but her throat was seared shut. The flames spread, and the black fumes grew thicker and thicker, making her eyes sting.

Then Robert emerged, leading Horizon. The stallion swept forward, chest high, ears c.o.c.ked. He tossed his mane, sending the long black strands flying in and out of the flames.

She reached again for the canteen, but this time the water did not help.

Robert's lips were moving. He gestured for her to come. "Walk." He wanted her to walk.

Yes, of course.

The fire followed, insidious flames creeping along invasive vines. When she slowed, the flames crawled; when she stopped, they crackled; when she hurried, they shot forward. The vines were the conduit, enabling the fire to spread from one tree trunk to the next. More and more orange wreaths spiraled up the bark to inflame moss and needles.

Her steps drifted into minutes, minutes into hours, her feet blistering along with her mind. Her riding boots had not been designed for endless walking, and her left ankle was rubbed raw. She could no longer track time. Had she been walking two hours or six?

The smoke intensified until she could make out little in the miasma, except the flames and the dark red coat of the stallion beside her-the stallion whose every move reminded her of Bianca's corpse.

Dead.

Dead.

Dead.

Then the fire began to spread from one branch to the next, burning around her in a shifting ring. She tried to keep walking, but the needles above her inflamed, hailing ash. She covered her face with her arm.

Pressure drew down her hand. She winced from the contact, but Robert did not release his grip. Instead, he moved in front of her, closer. For the first time in hours, the flames shrank back.

"You're limping, Aurelia." He nodded at a fallen log that was charred but not burning. "Please sit down."

Her searing ankle complied.

He released her hand, bent low, and unthreaded her boot laces. She bit her lip as he tugged off the torturous leather. Then gently he removed her stockings, his fingers lightly touching her bare ankle.

His eyes moved to hers. Blue. She had forgotten. So blue. If she stared into those eyes forever, she might remember who she was.

Then without warning, cold water splashed over her injury. And she screamed, her voice slamming through the trees and shadows of the forest. It ricocheted off earth and bark and the battered walls of her mind. She could not stop-did not want to stop. She wanted to keep on screaming until all the pain and blood, frustration and fury, let her go. She screamed until her tonsils burned and her throat was raw and her eyes watered. Until ...

The flames went out.

Her scream invaded Robert's veins. He had been wrong. He had thought nothing could be worse than her death, but losing her like this, right in front of him-this was death and agony and loss compounded together in living form.

He had tried so hard to convince himself he could save her. If he took one step at a time and focused on the details for bringing her north. If he blocked out what had happened, ignored the way his words drifted past her, the fact that she would not speak, the terror in her eyes that never left. If he planned for any event, checked for every danger, avoided all mistakes.

But his own hand-the simple act of trying to cleanse her bleeding skin with the water from the canteen-had ripped apart what was left of her sanity and unleashed a void.

He did not want to face this, did not want to see the young woman he had cherished since childhood disintegrate in front of him. He would rather just vanish in this tangled sliver of Tyralt, with her. Burying his head in his hands, he lived the scream.

A soft, fragile whisper brought him back. "Robert?"

Was he imagining what he wanted to hear-the sound of his own name once more from her lips? Had he succeeded in losing his own mind?

"Robert, look at me, please." She was speaking.

He searched her dark brown gaze and, for the first time since the attack nearly ten hours before, found ... her. Thank Tyralt. He tried to reach for her, to enfold her in his arms and prove to himself that she was there-whole-in front of him.