The village had come alive. There was new life, and people scurried and scuttled. Children were underfoot, and an outdoor market, not all that different from the market in Jeru City’s square, lined the main thoroughfare. People were selling their wares and talking excitedly among themselves. A new well was being dug. A man from Doha was coming to Solemn. He was said to have the Gift to call water. He would walk without shoes, his toes curling into the dirt, and he could feel the water beneath the surface, no matter how deep. For the time being, the village had assigned all the able men to carry water from the stream near the cliffs.
Kjell was greeted with awe and tears. It made his stomach clench and his hands sweat. His name was called out, and food was pressed into his hands, presents laid at his feet. He tried to give it back, to refuse, but the people backed away, leaving their offerings and shaking their heads. One woman brought him a goat, tugging it behind her with a determination not to be out-gifted.
“No!” he roared. “I am a soldier. I can’t take your goat.” The animal bleated piteously, and the woman looked as though he’d struck her. She wore a pale green scarf over her hair. The material was soft and fine, and the color would not draw the heat.
Sasha had given her veil away.
“I will take your head covering. Give me that instead. You keep the goat.”
“But the goat is a better gift!”
“I don’t want it. I want the scarf. I need two more like it, in different colors. And three dresses. About your size. And boots. For a lady.” He reached for his coin pouch, but the people around him, enlivened by his requests, ran to fulfill them.
The woman smiled, nodding happily, and shyly withdrew her scarf. Her hair was as black as Sasha’s eyes, and Kjell’s mind immediately returned to the things he’d learned that morning. Sasha did not belong in Quondoon.
He brushed the niggling aside, immediately distracted by tradesmen and women, presenting him with veils and gowns and jewelry and shoes, sized to fit a tall, slim woman.
He pushed the ridiculous away—the jewelry and the slippers that would tear with any use—and barked his preferences with little fanfare, choosing colors that wouldn’t compete with Sasha’s hair or absorb the sunlight, and fabrics that wouldn’t abrade her skin or be difficult to wash. He’d never selected clothes for a female, and he spent more coin than he made in a month, just to be done with it. He paid two young boys to trail him with his purchases, but had hardly made it out of the market when he was hailed by the elder named Byron, the brother of the deceased Mina, Sasha’s master.
“Captain!” Byron called, his girth making him struggle to catch Kjell. Kjell stopped abruptly and turned, directing the boys to Sasha’s house and asking them to deliver the purchases to the woman who lived there. They seemed to know who she was—one of them called her the red witch—and trotted off, eager to do his bidding, his money in their pockets.
“We are grateful, Highness,” Byron said, bowing slightly as he reached him. “The people of Solemn will never forget you.”
“If it were left to me, I would have let you all rot. Your gratitude is misplaced.” He ignored the title. “You owe the woman a great debt.”
“I will give her to you,” Byron rushed, spreading his hands magnanimously.
“You will . . . give her to me?” Kjell asked, his voice flat.
“She may be of use to you,” the elder continued eagerly. “And she is no longer of use to my sister.”
“The elder said she’d been among you three years. How did she get here?”
“I was in Firi, in the employ of the Lord of Quondoon.” Byron puffed his chest proudly. “The refugees flooding Firi were numerous. You know that. She was with a group of people, many of them from Kilmorda, looking for work. I saw her on the blocks with a dozen other women. She was blank. Like a wall. I found it useful. The other women were crying. Traumatized. She wasn’t. I didn’t want trouble. I wanted a companion for my sister.”
Even the name Firi made his stomach knot and tighten. “I have no use for a slave,” Kjell said. “You will give Sasha her freedom. You will give her your sister’s home. And you will provide money for her welfare.”
“She is not safe here,” Byron protested, and he had the conscience to look embarrassed by the admission.
“You are a powerful man. You will see to it that she is.”
Byron swallowed, nodding.
Sasha thanked him with a smile for the packages he’d had delivered, but her smile slipped away when he told her he was leaving.
“This is your house. You will serve only yourself from now on.” He placed a small purse filled with gold coin on the table. “This is yours. There will be more. I’ve seen to it.”
Her eyes rose to his, dark and knowing, and his confusion and frustration writhed within him. She didn’t argue or count the money. She watched him walk from the house without asking him to take her with him, but he condemned himself with every step.
His horse had been readied, his men assembled, and within minutes they were riding back through the streets of Solemn, the farewell far different than the welcome had been. Children ran, people called out, and once again, a procession formed behind them, throwing bits of rice and wishing them Godspeed, as though they were off to wage war, instead of leaving the battle behind them. On the outskirts of the town the other half of the King’s Guard waited, watching their approach, unsmiling, unimpressed by the change in the villagers.
Kjell wanted to turn his head to see if Sasha was among them. He wanted to look at her once more, to see if she had joined the farewell procession, but he resisted. He had restored her health, made arrangements for her welfare, and he did not owe her anything else. And she owed him nothing. She was free to go wherever she wished. He rode with his back stiff, his eyes forward, and he left the crowd behind, the well-wishes and cries fading into silence.
“She follows, Captain,” Jerick murmured beside him.
Kjell jerked around, finding the lone figure trailing them a short ways off. She appeared to be running. It was hot, and the temperature would make the travel slow. The horses would not be able to carry the soldiers far if they pushed them, but Sasha would hurt herself if she tried to keep pace on foot.
“Blast. Bloody hell!” Kjell swore softly.
“We grow farther away every moment. She will go back,” Jerick said mildly.
“No, she won’t,” Kjell stewed. He closed his eyes against his guilt and his strange elation. She followed. And he was glad.
“I can’t leave her. She was driven out of Solemn. If she doesn’t want to remain there, we need to take her somewhere else,” he said.
“I agree, Captain.”
“But where?” Kjell barked, wishing Jerick hadn’t capitulated so readily.
“Take her to Jeru City. She can work in the palace.”