CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
RAFE
I wrestled with the body, hoisting it across the back of my horse. Blood smeared my shoulder. The smell of decay hadn’t set in yet, but I had to turn away from the rank odor of neglect and excrement for a breath of fresh air. That’s the way of death. There’s no dignity in it.
A deep, rugged gorge was just over the ridge. I headed there, leading my horse through the woods. Animals and the elements would take care of the body long before anyone ventured into that remote abyss. It was all he deserved.
I couldn’t get the image of her bloody neck out of my mind. I had seen plenty of bloody necks before, but … ordered by her own father? It was no ordinary bandit who attacked her. This man had been on the road for weeks looking for her. I knew there was a warrant posted for her arrest and a bounty for her return. It had been chattered about in a town I stopped in near Civica when I was searching for her myself. I thought the warrant was only a shallow gesture to appease Dalbreck.
Just who were the barbarians now? The Vendans or the Morrighese? What kind of father ordered his own daughter’s murder? Even wolves protect their own cubs. No wonder she ran.
Killing in the name of war was one thing. Killing one’s own kin was quite another.