A Soul for Vengeance

Chapter 4



Kell’s skin burned as though someone had set fire to it. He slapped at his arms and legs, hoping to douse the flames, but the heat moved deeper inside, singeing his lungs, his bowels, his heart. A wail of pain rose from his throat. He’d endured the sting of the Thallians’ whips, the extreme temperatures of the prison ship, the months of starvation without making a sound. But this new torture threatened to break him.

With every new wave of agony, the face of a loved one followed, each of them mocking his weakness. His father, his mother, his brothers, his best friend. But Arden’s was the cruelest. Her sensuous mouth now twisted with a cruel smile as she laughed at his pain. “I was right to turn you down. You’re nothing but a weakling, not nearly the man Dev is.”

Her taunting words unleashed a new form of torment in his veins. She never wanted him. No one wanted him alive. It would be so easy to give up and end this. So easy to stop breathing and still the mad beating of his heart.

So easy to drift into the abyss of death…

“Kell,” a woman’s soft voice whispered. “Kell, please open your eyes.”

A pair of hands touched his forehead, then his cheeks. They were small like a woman’s, but had the combat-hardened callouses that only came with the daily handling of a weapon. Their warmth drove away the last harrowing nightmares that clung to his consciousness and beckoned him to leave the world of dreams. When he opened his eyes, he found himself staring into a pair of familiar gray eyes. “Zara?”

Her full lips rose ever so slightly. “So you do remember me.”

How could he forget her? She was his best friend’s little sister, always tagging along on their adventures growing up. She was also the first girl he’d ever kissed, an action that resulted in a black eye when she let him know his romantic overtures were not appreciated. It had been nearly two years since he’d seen her. She’d shed the last of her childish softness in favor of more womanly curves, all dominated by those large thick-lashed eyes.

His pulse quickened as he stared at her, wondering how his fate had changed so quickly from rotting on a prison ship to laying in the arms of a beautiful woman. “Where’s Bynn?”

“Back at the camp. We’ll take you to him as soon as you’re well enough to travel.”

“I’m well enough to travel now.” He tried to rise, his muscles trembling with the effort required just to get into a sitting position. His head swam, but he managed to keep his voice steady as he continued, “We’ve wasted enough time.”

A firm tug on his shirt had him back in Zara’s lap. She blew her unruly dark curls out of her eyes. “Stop trying to be heroic. You can’t even sit up, Kell. How are you going to stay on a horse for the next fortnight?”

“I’ll manage.” Images of his time spent on the ship blended with the snippets of conversations he’d managed to overhear. The Thallians had invaded Ranello, and he’d been their prisoner. It was only through the grace of the Lady Moon that they never discovered who he truly was. They starved him, beat him, left his body battered and bruised, but they’d never broken him. Two weeks in a saddle would be nothing compared to what he’d already experienced.

Zara kept her hand planted firmly against his chest. “I’m sure you will, but first, you need to eat and wait until we are ready.”

A man moved behind her, coming close enough to the lone lantern in the room to where Kell could see the hollows along his cheeks. He gave her a bowl and slipped back into the shadows.

“I’m sorry, but it’s a bit cold.” She wedged a wad of fabric under his head so he could eat and held out a spoonful of thick stew. “At least it’s filling.”

The stew was heavy on the beans and potatoes with a slight hint of fish. His stomach lurched with the first bite after being fed little more than water for months. However, it calmed with each spoonful she fed him.

The meal ceased the conversation long enough for him to assess his surroundings. They were in a small, damp room lit only by a single lantern a few feet away. Light filtered in from the cracks of the wooden ceiling above. He counted three other people in the room besides him and Zara, all men judging by the shape of their shadows. “Where are we?” he asked as she scraped the last bits of the stew from the bowl.

“In a safe place,” she replied, shoving the spoon into his mouth.

“Where?” He was a prince, and he demanded answers.

Zara’s mouth formed a stubborn line. “Boznac.”

“And where is Bynn? Where is my father? My brothers?”

With each question, her lips grew thinner and thinner as though she wanted to lock the truth away from him. “I’ll tell you more when you are ready.”

“No, you will tell me now.” He tried to rise again, only to have her push him back down.

Three loud bangs came from the floor above, and everyone in the tiny room froze. One of the men doused the lantern as Zara placed her finger on his lips and cast her gaze upwards. Even over the pounding of his heart, he could hear the conversation above. A man, a Ranellian, was speaking with two men with Thallian accents. Their words were muffled, but their tones left little doubt as to the contents of the exchange. The Thallians were there to search the Ranellian’s property, and he could do little more than stand out of their way. Heavy objects crashed against the walls. The floorboards creaked in protest as the heavy Thallian boots stomped across the room. At last, they exchanged a few more words with the owner, all culminating with a slammed door that rattled the whole building.

In the silence that followed, Kell became acutely aware that Zara’s finger was still pressed against his lips. Her quick breaths made her breasts strain against the tight bodice she wore, and the wide-eyed look of fear on her face stirred up an uncomfortable sensation deep within his chest. He wanted nothing more than to take her in his arms and comfort her, but he doubted she’d appreciate it. If anything, he’d probably earn another black eye if he dared to try it.

He lowered her hand back to his chest, letting it rest right above the place where his heart thumped. She turned to him as the lantern flared back to life. Her lips remained parted, her brows inching closer together as though his action confused her. Her response only deepened his desire to wrap his arms around her and tell her everything would be alright.

Although based on the tense moments a second ago, nothing could be further from the truth.

She withdrew her hand and looked away, a faint of color rising into her cheeks. Another series of loud knocks—two quick jabs followed by a solid thwack—sounded. Zara rose to her feet. “Stay here. I’ll go ask Thao what happened.”

She slid a latch back to open the trap door in the ceiling and lifted herself up, her long legs clad in tight leather breeches rather than a skirt. A quick glimpse of the room above showed sunlight streaming along stacks of wooden crates and barrels. The trap door fell back into place, shuttering the room back in darkness.

Minutes ticked by, marked only by the slowing of his pulse and the garbled words above. The men in the room with him remained so still and silent, he wondered if they’d turned into statues. Then the trap opened again, and Zara reappeared. “You two, come help Thao clean up the mess the Thallians left.”

Two of the shadows moved, climbing up to the floor above before Zara lowered herself back into the small cellar room. She spoke to the man who lingered. “They heard Thao had received an illegal shipment.”

“Not far from the truth,” the man replied, his gravelly voice also familiar. He came closer, the lantern illuminating his bald head and creased face. Parros, the captain of Cordello’s forces. “Don’t suppose they know about him?”

“Sweet Lady Moon, I hope not.” Zara closed the trap door. “I’ll feel much better once we get him out of Boznac.”

They were talking about him as though he was invisible. “I’m right here, you know.”

“Yes,” Zara snapped back, “and we’re doing our best to keep you alive.”

He lifted his head, the room no longer spinning this time, but his weakened body rebelled at the idea of doing more. A small curse fell from his lips. “You think it’s too dangerous to linger here, yet you refuse to let me leave.”

“He has a point, m’lady.” Parros rested his hand on the sword that had hung from the knight’s belt as long as Kell could remember. “Perhaps we should come up with a new escape plan.”

She glanced around the room her gaze stopping at the trap door, and nodded. “Before the Thallians find us.”

Coffins.

Not exactly what Zara had in mind when she asked Thao to find a way to sneak Kell out of the city. She tested the sturdy wooden boxes, nodding at the solid sound her knuckles made against the thick beams. “Is this all you could come up with?”

Thao crossed his arms and grinned, the bruises on his face now fully bloomed from his most recent exchange with the Thallian soldiers. “Got a better idea?”

“Perhaps something designed for the living?”

“I’m sorry to have to tell you this, m’lady, but I don’t think the prince is quite ready to enter the world of the living.”

She drew in a deep breath, not wanting to acknowledge how close to the truth Thao was. Kell had drifted in and out of consciousness over the last week, caught in the hellish withdrawals from the nightmare powder that Thallians had fed him while he was imprisoned. The only coherent conversation she’d had with him was two nights ago when the Thallian soldiers ransacked Thao’s warehouse. The rest of the time, he called out for Arden, the yellow-haired witch he’d followed to Gravaria when his people needed him the most.

She curled her fingers into her palm, letting her nails bite into her skin. The pain cleared her head from the blood-stained memories that haunted her own dreams. “He’s making progress. Hopefully, by the time we get him to the camp, he’ll be ready to take on the responsibilities required of him.”

“I pray to the Lady Moon you’re right.” He pushed the coffins on top aside and pointed to the one in the center of the back row. “I suggest we put him in here. That way, if the soldiers decide to inspect your cargo, it would be the hardest one for them to open.”

She hopped up onto the cart and inspected the coffin. “We’ll need to cut a couple of holes for him to breathe.”

“It’s not like we’re burying him in the ground, Zara.”

The informal use of her name earned the merchant a sharp glance, one that made him lower his eyes and mumble an apology. Despite the upheaval the Thallians had caused, she was still the daughter of a duke, and he was common born. Yet, a second later, she remembered they were all equals now that the Thallians had destroyed everything.

She softened her emotions and ran her hand along the top. “How many were you able to get?”

“Twelve, m’lady.”

More than enough to sneak her, Kell, and her men out of the city. She laid out the configuration in her mind. The coffins were stacked two high, three across and two deep in the back of the cart. “We’ll place the prince there. I’ll take the one beside him, and Leo can take the other side.”

“Don’t you dare think of putting me in a wooden box,” Parros said from behind her.

She turned around and gave the former captain of her father’s forces a sweet smile. “I wouldn’t dream of it. You’re playing the role of gravedigger.”

“Outstanding.” The blank expression on his face matched the dry tone of his voice, making her wonder if he thought his assignment was an improvement over the coffin. “One more question, though. What are we going to put in the top coffins in case we’re searched?”

Thao grinned. “Dead bodies.”

He was dreaming about her again.

The sunlight caught on her hair, making it sparkle like the purest gold as it fanned out around her. Her blue eyes filled with desire as she beckoned him closer. Heat coursed through his blood. He couldn’t resist her, not when her body called to him like this. He leaned over her, anxious to taste her sweet lips. “Arden,” he whispered.

“Your yellow-haired witch isn’t here.”

Kell’s eyes shot open at the sound of Zara’s cold voice. Any threads of lust leftover from his dream vanished, and the harshness of his reality set in. Arden was miles away in Gravaria, and he was hiding in a cellar. “I wish she was here,” he said, his throat dry.

Zara raised a cup of wine to his lips. “Why? So you could use her against the Thallians like you did the necromancer?”

“You wouldn’t understand.” No one did. Arden possessed great power—power he’d need if he had any hope of defeating the Thallians. But she’d also captured his heart in a way no woman had before. Even though he was back in his homeland, he still felt like a part of him had remained in Gravaria.

The part of him that made him confident he could rise against the odds and make the impossible happen.

“Why wasn’t she with you?”

“The Empress forced her to stay.” Kell took a sip of the bitter wine and winced as it burned all the way through his gut. “She needed to complete her training.”

“She probably never cared about this place anyway.” Zara removed the cup and helped him up. “I know I would be glad to leave a place if I was going to end up on a pyre.”

“You’re wrong about her. If she could be here, she would.”

“So you say.” She guided his arms through the sleeves of a thick wool overtunic. “Are you ready to leave?”

“I’ve been counting down the minutes.” In truth, he had no idea how much time had passed, but he needed to know what lay outside this hiding place. He needed to know what was left of the Ranello he’d left behind and what he needed to do to restore it to its former glory.

His response earned him a wry smile. “Tonight, you’ll have your wish. Thao found a way for us to safely get you out of the city without you having to ride a horse.”

The admiration in her voice for the devisor of this plan stirred up an uncomfortable sensation in the center of his stomach. “And who is Thao?”

“A merchant who’s remained loyal to Ranello and a strong ally.”

She pulled him to his feet so quickly, Kell had no time to engage his muscles. He fell against her, his bones pressing into the soft curves of her body and reviving the heat from his dream. Only this time, it was a gray-eyed beauty that caused his reaction.

Her breath hitched, and her gaze locked with his. A flicker of surprise washed across her face before she seemed to remember why she was there. She propped him up with her arms, adding some much needed inches of breathing room between them. “Come on—we need to get you past the city walls before dawn, Kell.”

His mind remained fuzzy while she helped him out of the cellar. What had just happened between us? Have I gone so long without being near a woman that I’m ready to jump the first one I see?

“My apologies for crude travel arrangements, Your Highness” a man dressed in clothes befitting a well-to-do merchant said with a bow, “but this is the best I could do without raising the Thallians’ alarm.”

The site of an open coffin sobered him quicker than a plunge in the icy sea. “Please say that’s intended for someone else.”

“I’m afraid not. Please forgive me, but we can’t waste any time.” Zara pushed him facedown into the wooden box.

The lid covered him before he had a chance to scramble out. His heart jumped into this throat, choking him in the dark void as though he’d donned the black hood offered to men right before they were hung. He managed to turn over in the tight space, but it did little to help ease the ever-increasing struggle for air as he battled his most primal fear. Something heavy slid on top of his coffin. A putrid odor invaded his nostrils with each breath he managed to suck in. He was being buried alive. His lungs tried to keep time with the rapid fluttering of his heart, faster and faster until a scream of panic welled up deep inside.

Then, out of the darkness, a small hand squeezed his elbow and smothered his anxiety. He reached up and grabbed it for dear life. His free arm traced the source of his reassurance to a small hole cut from the side of the coffin.

“I’m right here, Kell,” Zara said from the box next to him. “You’ll only have to stay in there for a few hours.”

He doubted she knew how much that comforted him. He wasn’t alone in this hell. “The smell?”

“An unfortunate part of the ruse.”

He closed his eyes and pretended that he was in his own bed, that Zara was lying next to him without the wooden panels between them. His heart quieted, and his breathing slowed. But he didn’t dare release her hand. It steadied his raw nerves when the cart jerked forward and rattled across the cobblestoned streets. And it calmed his frazzled mind enough to where he could hear the exchange between Parros and the Thallian guards at the city gates.

“What do you have there?” one of them asked.

“Just some unfortunately souls that require a burial outside the city wall, as dictated by the law,” Parros replied in the cadence of a simple laborer.

A fist knocked against the coffin on his other side, and the cart tilted down toward the edge as a man grunted. One of the coffins above him shifted, refreshing the odor of decomposing bodies.

Zara hand tightened around his, squeezing it tight enough to staunch the flow of blood to his fingers. Her fear bled into him and stilled his breath until he mimicked the corpses above him.

“You’re welcome to inspect the bodies, but I’m afraid some of them aren’t as fresh as they were a few days ago.” A cry of disgust came from one of the soldiers, followed by Parros’s laughter. “I tried to warn you.”

The coffins shifted again, and the cart shook. “These bodies should’ve been buried days ago.”

“I know, I know, but I wanted to make sure I had a full cart before leaving the city. Too much of a hassle to get in and out, if you know what I mean.”

“Get those vile things out now before their stench kills us all,” the Thallian soldier ordered, his voice muffled as though he’d covered his nose and mouth while he spoke.

Zara’s fingers relaxed, and the blood flowed back into Kell’s fingers again. He released the breath he’d been holding.

“As you wish, sir.”

The cart jerked forward again, and the sharp clatter of cobblestones eventually gave away to the soft whisper of dirt roads. Cold crept into his bones, stiffening his joints and knotting his muscles, but the tight confines kept him from moving to warm them up. His nose burned, both from the stench and the icy air. It would’ve been unbearable had he not held on to the one thing that reminded him he wasn’t alone in all this—Zara’s hand. He laced his fingers through hers and focused on controlling the slow draw and release of each breath.

At last, the cart stopped, and scratch of wood on wood pulled him from the trance-like state he’d gone into since they’d made it past the Thallian guards. Zara jerked her hand away seconds before the blinding sunlight hit him. He held his hand out in front of him, the black dots eventually fading to reveal Parros leaning over him.

“Looks like he’s still alive.”

Zara appeared beside the soldier and helped Kell out of the coffin. “Of course he is.”

He inched toward the edge of the cart, the effort exhausting him. As he sat on the edge to catch his breath, he studied the small band of people who’d rescued him. It was the first time he’d been able to see their faces, but the only ones he recognized were Parros and Zara. “May I have the names of those responsible for saving my life?”

The men exchanged glances with each other before bowing their heads and mumbling their names.

“I thank you all for risking your lives to free me. At the moment, all I can reward you with is my gratitude, but when I’m back in Trivinus, I wish to reward you properly.”

“Getting those Thallians out of Ranello will be thanks enough,” one of the men replied.

“Agreed.” Zara’s face hardened, her eyes becoming steely with hatred. “We are all working toward the same goal.”

“As am I.” He hopped off the cart, his knees buckling on impact. Zara rushed forward to catch him, but he waved her away. If he was going to lead his people, he couldn’t afford to be seen leaning on a woman. After a few seconds, his muscles stopped trembling enough to hold him steady. “What is our plan from here?”

He’d looked to Parros, but it was Zara who answered. “Dump the bodies and continue on to the camp.”

“How long do you think it will take?”

“To dump the bodies? Not that long. They were Thallians and deserve to become food for the ravens.” Her grin sent a shiver down his spine. “After that, we’re looking at two to three weeks until we get to the camp, depending on conditions.”

“What conditions?”

“Weather, troop movement.” She paused and stared directly at him as she added, “General health of the group.”

Kell gritted his teeth, his legs already twitching with fatigue. “I have no desire to be the weakest link.”

She looked like she wanted to say something more, but merely nodded. “Perhaps you’d like to wait by the creek while we lighten our load.”

He managed to make it to a boulder beside the water before his body gave out on him. How was he going to lead his people when he couldn’t walk a few feet without collapsing? He dropped to his knees and broke through the ice on the surface to splash some water on his face and over the top of his head. The bitter cold cleared the fogginess from his mind and sharpened his senses. His hair was much shorter than he’d ever remembered. He ran his fingers along his face, frowning at the coarse whiskers along his cheeks.

Zara crouched beside him and offered a knife. “I tried to clean you up as much as possible, but you wouldn’t want me trying to shave you.”

He took the blade and scratched it along his skin, trimming his beard back to stubble. “So you’re the one I have to thank for my haircut?”

“It was much easier than trying to comb it out.” She tugged at one of the curls that had slipped free from her tight braid. “Trust me—I know.”

He waited for the water to still before checking his reflection. With his closely cropped hair and sunken cheeks, he looked more like his eldest brother, Gandor, than he cared to admit. His skin was sallow, and dark circles framed his dull eyes. “I look like the walking dead.”

“You have no idea how close you were to becoming that.” Zara took a deep breath and held it a second, her lips pursed. “I know you have no desire to appear weak, Kell, but don’t make a martyr of yourself. My mission is to bring you back alive, and if that means I need to put you back in one of those coffins for your own safety, I will do it.”

His spine stiffened. “Are you threatening me?”

“No, but I’m letting you know right now that I’m going to do all that I can to make sure we succeed, even if it means using brute force.”

“There will be no need for that. I know my limits.”

“Good to know.” She stood and offered him a hand. “Shall we join the others?”

He refused her help, clinging to the boulder instead as he rose from his knees.

A pile of bloated corpses waited beside the cart, but the coffins remained on board. “Is there a reason why we’re keeping them?” he asked.

“Of course.” Zara hopped on the cart and opened one of the coffins, lifting up the false bottom to reveal a stash of swords and arrows. “We don’t want to lose all our cargo.”

For the first time in weeks, he found a reason to smile. His people may have been beaten, but they were preparing to fight back. “Very clever.”

“I agree.” She closed the lid and sat on top of it. “Why don’t you ride up front with Parros, Your Highness? The rest of us will walk.”

“For the next two weeks?”

She shook her head. “Only until we reach the next checkpoint. We should be able to get horses there.”

Parros pulled him up into the seat beside him and snapped the reins. “You’d be wise to listen to Lady Zara.”

“Oh?”

The old soldier nodded. “You have no idea how stubborn she can be.”

Kell rubbed his cheek, remembering all too clearly how strong her right hook could be. “Warning noted.”