Fugitive (5 page)

“Kill you?” Shock sizzled through me. I was her prisoner. I was weak. Dying, maybe. Did she fear
me
? Surely she didn’t think I was dangerous. Did she?

She yanked her wrist free from my hand and slammed her elbow into my nose. Pain exploded through my head as she jarred the place where the soldiers had broken it only weeks before. I fell back, seeing lines of white, and she rolled away and ran for the door.

“Wait,” I cried out. “Stop—”

By some miracle, she listened. She stopped.

“I’m sorry if I hurt you.” I was pleading now. “I just needed answers.”

“You would kill me for information, then?” she snapped.

I laughed in pure disbelief, and the laugh turned into a wheeze of pain. “I’m not a murderer of farm girls,” I ground out. Was this what she thought of me? That I was some dangerous criminal on the loose? “Not even those who plan to harm me,” I added.

“Harm you? I’m sticking my neck out for you. I’m putting my family in danger for you. I’m sheltering and feeding you—and for what? It’s you who just tried to harm me.”

I didn’t believe her. She had a shrewd look to her. This was a story to keep me docile. Hiding me? Sheltering me? When she looked at me, I saw calculation and mistrust in her eyes. I didn’t know what her plan was, but whatever it was, I couldn’t trust her.

Still, maybe I could cajole her into letting me go.

“I just need information about my location,” I said. “I won’t try anything again, I promise.”

She relaxed slightly, as if she was convinced I’d bought her story of defenselessness and fear.

“Even though I know you want me dead,” I added, seeing her expression.

She laughed once, derisively. “You make no sense.” She yanked something from her pocket and held it aloft. Herbs. “I came to bring you these for your wound. I’m not going to kill you. I just want you gone before you can cause any more trouble.”

Uncertainty darted me, making me pause. She’d brought herbs? “You’re lying.”

“Why would I lie? If I wanted to kill you, I’d have done it by now. I could have simply left you in the snow, or refused to clean your wounds, or refused to feed you.”

Her words rang true. I said nothing, absorbing them. I remembered her face, stark with fear and harshness as she cleaned my wounds. I remembered her snapping at me to lie still. Yet she had cleaned them. She had brought me food. She had given me a bed, albeit one of straw on the floor of a barn.

“Why haven’t you?” I blurted. “Left me to die, I mean.”

The farm girl bit her lip. She was beautiful, I thought suddenly. Beautiful in a wild, frightening kind of way, like a hawk, or a snake. Beautiful in a plain way, like a barren tree against a dark sky. Her long hair was captured in a braid that hung over her shoulder. Her thin face was edged with freckles. Her eyes were dark, and I couldn’t discern their color. Those eyes fixed on me now as she considered my question with utter seriousness.

“We had a dog once,” she said, choosing her words as if she were arguing for something. Arguing with me or with herself, I didn’t know which.

I listened. I licked my lip and tasted blood.

“It was a pitiful little thing with half a tail and button-black eyes,” she continued. “It chased the chickens and made a nuisance of itself, and once it got lost in the forest and we couldn’t find it. Eventually, it came back with one leg dragging. It was shivering and sick. We don’t have time to take care of sick pets, but my mother nursed that little thing back from the brink of death. I asked her why, and she said life was precious. She said we couldn’t forget that.”

I saw it all in my mind’s eye. I saw her, a little girl with eyes just as fierce, and a puppy, wriggly and small, with a drooping tail and wet nose. I saw the puppy in the snow and a little girl with eyes full of hope. Something in my chest ached.

“Did it live?” I asked.

“She,” the girl said, and her face lightened as if she’d just uncovered a fact long-forgotten. “I remember—it was a female. Snowball. She died of old age last winter.”

How harsh was this world that she forgot so easily a dog that had only died a year ago? I shivered, and as I shivered, pain shot across my back like fire.

The girl saw it, too. She stepped closer. “Take off your shirt.”

I looked at her, startled by the command.

Her face creased with an expression that appeared to be exasperation. “I’ve just told you—I’m not letting you die. You’re weak with fever, and I need to tend to that wound. Take off your shirt.”

I did as she commanded without a word. She crept closer to me, so close I could feel her warmth. I stared at the barn floor as she studied my back. I heard the swish of water as she retrieved the bucket and mixed the herbs in it, then the dribble of droplets as she withdrew a rag.

“This will help.” She pressed the hot herbal water to my back, and I hissed in pain as heat met the injuries. Streaks of fire shot across my skin and down my arms. I panted, holding in a scream.

When she’d finished, I crawled the few steps to my straw bed and collapsed. She dropped my shirt beside me and picked up the basket, setting it by my head.

“There’s food in the basket for you,” she said. “I’ll bring you more in the morning. Stew, if we have it.” She grabbed the dirty rags and turned to go.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

She stopped.

“For—for jumping you like that,” I continued. “I thought you wanted to hurt me.”

Her shoulders were stiff, but she didn’t leave. She didn’t say anything, either.

The silence swelled, thickened. I stared at her back, and I saw her strength, her determination, written in every line of her body. Admiration rose in me.

“What’s your name?”

Did she flinch? I couldn’t be sure. At first I thought she wasn’t going to reply, and then, so quietly I almost missed it, she said, “Lia.”

“Lia.” I repeated the name. It was simple, plain, and sharp on the tongue. There was a beauty to it, the same kind of stark beauty that haunted this wilderness. “My family called me Gabe.”

She didn’t respond. She went out into the snow, and I heard the door lock behind her.

THEN

THE PRISON WAS cold. Hallways pressed in close. The walls squeezed tight around me. My chest constricted as doors clanged shut behind me and the exit vanished, and panic scrambled in my lungs and ran up my throat in words.

“No, no, no,” I gasped. “Please.”

Nobody listened.

Two guards escorted me through the labyrinth of stone. One strode ahead, whistling tunelessly. The other held my arm, as if I might run.

Where would I run to in this place of darkness? At least six doors had already been shut between me and freedom.

My broken nose throbbed, and the pain was nauseating. Blood flowed down my lip and chin.

The first guard stopped in front of a cell door and produced a ring of keys from his belt. He unlocked it and yanked the bars. The door scraped open with a rusty wail.

A shiver seized me and shook me to the bones.

The second guard planted a hand between my shoulder blades and shoved. I pitched forward on my hands and knees.

They left me there.

Rain ran off my clothes and puddled on the floor. I dragged myself to the edge of the cell and tucked my legs into my chest. Slowly, I became aware of my surroundings in more detail. The floor was uneven, scattered with grime. A bucket sat in one corner, reeking of refuse. Distant shouts and sounds of crying echoed through the halls.

Something stirred in the corner. I drew back, horrified, as a rumpled shadow straightened and revealed a face. A cellmate.

He was in shadow, but I caught a glimpse of stringy hair, bushy eyebrows, and mouth full of broken teeth. Had he arrived looking thus, or is this what this place reduced him to?

I wiped some of the blood from my face with my wet sleeve. Even the slightest prod of my injured face made me hiss in pain. The memory of my sister, splattered in my blood, flashed through my mind. Panic gripped me again. Had they been arrested, too?

How long would I be here? A day? A month? A year?

I bent over and tried to breathe. Pain flamed through my face. My gut clenched. I almost vomited. Regaining my composure, I slumped back against the bars and looked at my cellmate again.

“How long have you been in here?” I asked.

“Stuff you,” he growled. “You deserve to be in here, with your fancy clothes and your airs. You’re the Dictator’s enemies, not the likes of me.”

I was silent. He didn’t know who I was. How could he? I must be nearly unrecognizable by now.

Footsteps rang out. The guard returned and looked at us through the bars. I started to scramble up. Hope flared in me. My mother and father had spoken to someone, pulled strings—Korr had changed his mind, retracted whatever he had done—

But when the guard unlocked the cell, he took my cellmate instead of me.

I dropped to the filthy stone floor and shut my eyes after they’d gone. I thought of the scrap of paper that had been in my pocket. I thought of my sister and her birthday. I thought of Korr’s black, expressionless eyes as I was dragged out of the house in front of everyone.

My fingers curled into fists, and I wanted to scream, but all that escaped me was a groan.

Hours later, the guards returned with my cellmate. His hands were bandaged. At the ends of the bandages, I saw blood.

I curled up in a ball and faced the bars.

NOW

I HEARD VOICES. I cracked open my eyes, but the world was a blur of darkness and shadows and lantern light.

Gentle hands touched me. They smelled of soap and bread. I leaned into them with a sigh.

“Lakin,” I murmured. It had to be Lakin. Who else would touch me so tenderly?

Slowly, details began to leak into my consciousness. I was lying on straw. My back burned with pain and my skin was hot. What was going on? Where was I? Why was Lakin here?

I became aware of the pain, and I thrashed against it. Everything hurt, every single joint in my wretched body ached and throbbed and shrieked with agony. I twisted, and the hands grasped me hard.

Soldiers?

I was hoisted up. I sank my face into soft hair that smelled sweet.

Lakin.

I breathed her name, and then I was in darkness again. Sweet, sweet darkness.

The light intruded abruptly. The air was cold. I moaned. My skin tingled as icy wind whipped across my cheeks, and I staggered forward while hands held me, guided me.

Where was I?

Warmth rushed over me again, and I heard the crackle of a fire. I sank onto a bed of softness, and heat licked at my face and soothed the aches of my body. I drifted away to darkness again in relief.

I saw their faces—my sister, Lakin, my mother and father. Fear gripped me, and I tried to sit up. What if they were tortured? What if they were killed for being traitors? It was me. It was me, not them. I tried to tell the guards, but the hands holding me were soft, and the voice was gentle in my ear. I relaxed. I let the hands soothe me, and the darkness, when it claimed me, was warm.

THEN

I dreamed of Lakin. We stood together in a field of green beneath a cloud-swept sky. In the distance I saw the city of Astralux, ringed in fog, but where we stood it was sunny.

“I loved you,” I told her, and my voice broke. “Why? Why did you leave me?”

She gazed at me, and her expression was surprisingly gentle. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Please,” I begged. “I’ve been arrested. I’m probably going to die. Please, at least give me an explanation.”

She shaded her eyes and looked away, toward the city. “Sometimes the bravest thing you can do is to allow yourself to be hated.”

“I don’t hate you,” I said. “But I don’t understand.”

“Sometimes the bravest thing you can do is go,” she said. “I didn’t want to, but what other choice did I have?”

Wind blew, making her dress flutter. She lowered her hand and looked back at me, but her face had turned into Korr’s.

“Wake up,” he said.

I opened my eyes. Korr stood outside my cell, holding a hat in his gloved hands. He took in the sight of me, and his lip curled with something that might have been disgust. Rage burned in me, but it was a weak flame, almost smothered by the fever searing my insides.

“Brother,” he said.

“I’m surprised you would still own that connection,” I gritted out. I pushed myself into a sitting position and took a shuddering breath. “Why are you here? To gloat?”

Korr shook his head. “They promised not to torture you. I am here to see that they have kept their word.”

I barked a laugh. “It depends on what you would call torture, I suppose.”

Korr said nothing. After another moment of standing there, he turned to go.

“Wait,” I said. I grabbed the bars and hauled myself forward. “Korr. Wait.”

He stopped, but he didn’t turn. His shoulders were taut.

“We both love her,” I said, and I wasn’t sure if I was talking about Lakin or my sister. “Please, spare them. Spare the rest of the family. They have done nothing to you.”

Korr’s fingers flexed against the brim of his hat.

“I will fix this,” he said, in a voice so low I almost didn’t hear him. “Trust me.”

My laugh of disbelief came out like a snarl.

“I’ll never trust you again,” I said.

He left without responding, and I sank to the floor of the cell and shut my eyes.

NOW

SHE DID NOT trust, this Frost girl who had saved my life, and neither did I. We shared that in common, and because of that, I understood a vital piece of her, though we were from different worlds. But aside from that thread that bound our souls together with stitches of pain, she was like an alien creature. There was a sharpness to her, a fire, and it was a departure from the honeyed, cultured sweetness that I’d known from the women of Aeralis. I’d never met anyone who was so full of fierceness, fight, and fragility at the same time.