Kjell went back after daylight to retrieve his saddle and his bags from Lucian’s body. He brought Isak, Jerick and Sasha with him—unwilling to let her out of his sight—leaving the rest of his men with strict instructions to prepare the party to depart. They would need to maneuver the wagons along the river banks until they could cut back through the woods that separated them from the road through Corvyn.
His bags had been rifled through, his possessions scattered, the extra gold he carried missing.
He cared more about his horse.
The act was more defiance and disdain than theft, and as Kjell loosened the bridle and pulled the saddle from Lucian’s body, he was consumed by an outrage that muted his grief.
Sasha gathered his strewn belongings with tragic eyes, filling the bags that Jerick slung over his shoulders, and then they stood back as Isak turned Lucian’s remains into ash. The stink of singed hair and scorched flesh tinged the air and made their eyes tear and their throats ache, but Kjell couldn’t bear to simply walk away without disposing of his friend. He didn’t speak of the Changer, of the threat that he didn’t completely understand, and he let the others believe Lucian had been a victim of his own fright and a forest filled with hungry creatures.
In the days that followed, Kjell hovered near Sasha, sleeping on his sword, ignoring Padrig’s pointed attempts to act as chaperone. Kjell had commandeered another soldier’s horse and assigned the man to ride shotgun in the blacksmith’s wagon. Sasha rode the grey beside him—as silent as she’d been in the first days out of Solemn—as they hugged the mountains that dipped down into Kilmorda. From a distance, the green stretch of land and rolling hills, dotted by villages too far away to examine, looked serene and promised peace. But the peace was hollow, the space stripped, and had they traveled inland, deeper into the valleys that lined the sea, they would have seen the piled bones and the empty villages, the scattered nests and the scars of war that left Kilmorda a verdant wasteland.
Eight days after leaving Jeru City, they smelled the sea and descended into the town sitting on the bay that shared its name, a place that had escaped the Volgar wave but had absorbed thousands of fleeing Kilmordians. As a result, Brisson had grown, spreading to the east—away from Kilmorda—and to the south, climbing into the foothills of the vast Corvar range.
After the cargo was loaded and the horses corralled, waiting to be loaded in the bowels of the ship for the week-long journey, the wagons were broken down into pieces that would be reassembled on the shores of Dendar. Ten chests of Dendar treasure had been loaded aboard the two ships as well, and Kjell knew better than to entrust the bounty with a group of sailors or a ship’s captain hired by Lord Corvyn. Kjell’s men took shifts on the docks, and the rest of the travelers made use of the marketplace and the public baths, making final preparations for the journey to a land that might offer few comforts and fewer guarantees.
Lord Corvyn, under Tiras’s instructions, had arranged lodging for the queen, Padrig, and members of the King’s Guard at an inn overlooking the docks and the two ships bound for Dendar. The lodgings were clean, the innkeeper gracious, and the food plentiful, if plain. But Kjell had no desire to stay at the inn. He wanted to spend the night on the docks with his men, free of the memories of an inn in Enoch and the first time he’d kissed Sasha, but he slept on Sasha’s floor, though the two maids sleeping in the small adjoining chamber gave him some reassurance in numbers.
A sense of desperate celebration broke out, and as the night wore on the atmosphere in the inn’s tavern grew more and more merry. The men coming in from the docks were loudly appreciative of a pretty wench with a lovely voice and bountiful breasts. She sang sad songs about brave knights and dragons, and Kjell, certain that no one could possibly sleep in the din—though Sasha hadn’t so much as sighed—crept from the room, stationing a guard at the door with instructions not to allow anyone—or anything—inside. He walked to the moored ships, checked on the rotation of the guard, walked by the animal enclosures, and tried not to think about Lucian or the Changer who had killed him.
When a shape broke from the shadows, shrouded and slim, he half expected it, even welcomed it, and drew his blade, eager to put an end to the chase. But the shadow paused and said his name.
“Sasha,” he hissed. “What are you doing?” He strode toward her and pulled her into an alcove. The inn wasn’t far—singing and laughter were as potent as brine in the breeze—but Sasha was alone and it was dark, and danger crept around every corner and lurked in a thousand possibilities. He gripped her shoulders harder than he should, but she simply stared up at him, waiting for his anger to pass, as if she understood the fear that limned it and the sentiment that motivated it.
“Your instructions to the guard at my door were to not let anyone in. You said nothing about letting me out. And unfortunately, Captain, I outrank you.”
Her words weren’t defiant but resigned, and though he dropped his hands from her shoulders, he didn’t step away. Slowly, like he was a wild creature and she didn’t want to frighten him, she took a small step and leaned into him, resting her cheek against his chest. For several seconds they breathed together, connected only where her sighs warmed his heart.
“I see no trouble here tonight, and I wanted to be with you,” she confessed.
“But you don’t see everything,” he whispered, repentant, and his arms moved of their own accord, enfolding her, his lips finding her hair.
“No. I see just enough to make everything I don’t see more confusing.”
He waited for her to expound, but she pressed her face harder into his chest, hiding her thoughts.
“Tomorrow will come, and I will have to be Queen Saoirse again and for every day after that,” she said.
“And now?” he asked, hating the hope he had no cause to feel.
“Now I am just Sasha who loves Kjell.”
He heard the surrender in her voice, and as she raised her face, his lips sought hers. She opened beneath him, welcoming his arrival. Their mouths melded and clung, tasting and torturing, jubilation flavored with loss. They withdrew only to come together again, to take just one more, and Kjell kissed her until his body raged and his lips begged for mercy.
It was Sasha who finally bowed her head, pressing her lips to his heart so they wouldn’t return to his mouth. Their bodies quaked and thrummed, denied and despairing, until short breaths became longsuffering and pounding blood became quiet questions.
“She follows—Ariel of Firi,” Sasha said.
“Yes,” he rasped. Her hands curled in his cloak.
“Why?” she asked.
“I don’t know.” He shook his head helplessly and tightened his arms. “There is something she wants.”