What had her father said when she first started to visit Granny? “If you get lost, don’t wander. Stay right where you are. The more you wander, the more lost you will become and the more tangled your trail. Wander too far, and your trail will be lost, and by the time trackers find you it might be too late.”
But was that wise advice to follow when there was someone back there who had put a knife to her throat?
What if he found her?
She shook with terror and cold, as the sweat of fear chilled on her body. And when she heard branches cracking behind her just as the moon came over the top of the hill, she had only enough presence of mind to look back, even as her hand reached for another crossbow quarrel to beat the poor mule with.
But the mule stretched her head and neck around and gave a pathetic bray, which was answered by an equally pathetic nicker, and the dark shape that came toward them was far too big to be a man afoot.
“Eric?” she called, her voice strained.
“I don’t know how you got that mule to run like a racehorse, but I’m glad you did,” came the grimly humorous reply. “Clearing off as you did gave me a free hand.”
She didn’t ask him what he meant by that; the mule shied a little as it scented what she did on him — fresh blood.
“Two untrained curs against me was no odds for them,” he continued. “Though you did half my work for me with the second.”
“I s-s-stabbed him with an a-a-arrow,” she stammered, teeth chattering.
“Good thinking. Or good reacting, if you didn’t think. He was bleeding like a lanced stag when he came at me. He’d have done better to run.” The horse came up alongside the mule, and the two beasts nuzzled each other in relief at finding their stablemates. “Are you hurt?”
“N-n-no…” She gulped back tears. “A l-little.”
By now the moon shone down through the branches, and he reached over to tilt her chin so it shone down on her face. “Ah. Didn’t tuck your head down,” he said with gruff sympathy. “That’ll hurt, all right. Wait a moment.” He rummaged into his saddlebag and came up with a jar. Pulling out the cork, he handed it to her, and she caught the familiar scent of one of her ointments. She took it from him with shaking hands, pulled off one glove with her teeth and dug two fingers into the jar. As she smeared on the ointment, the burning of the lash marks began to cool.
“You need to have a good cry?” Eric asked, in a conversational tone.
“I — I d-d-don’t know — ”
“Then swallow it down for a bit,” he advised. “Or just let it leak as we ride. I’ve got a few scratches to tend to, and you’ll be feeling like you want to faint before long, once all of this catches up with you.” He uttered something like a chuckle. “Hellfire, so will I, or at least sit down on something that isn’t moving.” He urged his horse ahead of her mule, and took the lead. She didn’t have to nudge the mule; she followed without any signal from her.
She shivered inside her fur-lined coat, gulping down tears, mind going numb, and yet, spinning with horrid images. The strange feeling as the arrow in her hand hit something solid — how badly had she stabbed the man? Badly enough to have killed him, if Eric hadn’t? The dreadful feeling of the knife at her throat and the grim certainty that she was going to die. That was twice, now — once when the wolf had attacked her, and now this —
The sick feeling, knowing that Eric had killed both those men. Yes, the men would have killed them without a moment of hesitation, but still, they were dead now, and she and Eric were alive.
She could still smell the blood on him. Oh, God, what if that meant she was getting the senses of the wolf? Had she escaped the knife only to fall to a worse fate?
She shivered and cried silently and clung to the mule as it shoved its way along the trail. She had never felt so cold before. And light-headed. Her fingers dug into the leather of the front of the saddle.
Eric’s voice penetrated her fog. “You did very well back there. No fainting, no hysterics.”
She had to gulp three or four times before she could make her voice work and still it shook. “It w-was by accid-d-dent.”
Again, that grim chuckle. “Either you’re lucky, or you have good instincts. For now, don’t faint on me” came the voice from ahead. “It’s not that far.”
“It isn’t?” Hope finally made her raise her eyes, and she realized she must have been in more of a fog than she had thought. They were out of the hills, and there was light off ahead through the trees. The mule seemed to realize this at the same time she did; she felt her startle a little beneath her legs, and her weary shuffle turned into a fast walk.
She blanked out a bit then, for the next thing she knew, invisible hands were helping her out of the saddle, and the mule was being led away. Eric’s arm around her shoulder steadied her for a moment as she wavered.
“You were fine back there,” he said in her ear, his arm feeling like nothing but that of a friend. “I was the one who was an idiot. I didn’t check to see if there were any of the bastards lurking in the trees. An amateur’s mistake. If you hadn’t kept your head, we’d have both been in trouble.” He gave her shoulders a squeeze, and chastely kissed her forehead between two of the lines of lashing. “Faugh. That ointment tastes like pine sap, and I stink of blood. We both need baths, food and sleep.”
Blood?
“You can smell the blood?” she asked.
He snorted. “Of course I can. I’m soaked in it. What, did you think you suddenly had a wolf’s nose?” He squeezed her shoulders again, then let go of her. “You lot. Get her to her rooms, get her in a hot bath and bring her a good meal. And a good stoop of brandy with it.”
With that, the Spirit Elementals took over, all but carrying her off to her rooms, where Sapphire stripped her out of her clothing and popped her into that hot bath before she could even say a word.
