turn her head and could only look one way. Unable to move, she stared at Murl’s dangling feet. The cook’s left foot was bare. Somewhere along the line she must have lost a shoe, and Samantha found her attention riveted by the toes of her former friend.
A noise behind her suddenly grabbed her attention. She strained against the leather thong but her head was fixed in place, her eyes darted down, but she still could not see the Executioner. He would have to come to the side to kill her and fear swelled in her that he was already in position on the opposite side. She closed her eyes waiting for the blow, but then she felt his hands on her legs, felt her skirts being lifted up.
“No!” she yelled and tried to kick out, but he was already positioned safely between her legs where she could not get at him. Her skirts came all the way up, and he piled the heavy fabric up on her back and atop of her tied hands, then she felt him ripping at her undergarments. They pulled away very easily, and suddenly she could feel the cool air of the day on her upper thighs and buttocks.
“No!” she yelled again as his hands ran over her bare legs, touching her everywhere at will. She squirmed and felt the skirts fall back down, but they were quickly yanked up once more, and with a shock as great as any she felt that day, one of his fingers entered her.
Samantha gasped as the Executioner leaned his face very close to her ear and laughed quietly. “You are ready,” he said as he moved his finger in and out of her painfully. “I knew you were like me.”
“Stop,” she pleaded, her voice hoarse, and she began squirming once more.
“Yes, I like it when you move,” he whispered and then his finger was out of her. She could hear him fumbling with his clothes, and she panicked once more.
“Please,” she begged, but he just chuckled. She bucked as hard as she could and felt her skirts fall back down, but they were hoisted up and then she felt him trying to enter her. It was all so quick she didn’t have time to register what was happening. She felt him thrust against her…close, and then with a sharp pain he was deep inside her.
She screamed, but he ignored her and began the rhythmic pumping of rape. She began to cry, but he did not stop until her skirts fell back once more. She heard him curse and withdraw, tugging at her clothes. They came up quickly enough and once more he was in her. She stopped fighting, and just cried her sobs keeping time with the incessant pounding and then her skirts fell again. He growled in frustration, and to Samantha’s surprise she felt the bonds at her wrists cut. Her hands instantly fell to her side and began to tingle as blood rushed back into them. She moved them to the block, using her arms to take some weight from her neck and shoulders. Once again her skirts were lifted, this time farther up nearly over her head, and then he was in her again, moving frantically now. He continued for a few minutes more, though for both of them it felt like much longer and then she felt his hot seed as it was released deep inside her. He collapsed down on her back, his weight hurting her neck, but she forced herself to make no sound. He remained where he was for several long moments, breathing heavily into her ear.
“I’m not through with you yet,” he whispered and suddenly the weight of him was off of her. She dared not move and strained to hear his movements. Unbelievably she heard his steps receding. Hope flared in her. Was it possible that he had forgotten about her hands? Surely not. He’d just cut her bonds a few minutes prior, but then she heard the telltale squeak of the front door to the house and knew he’d gone inside. Frantically she reached up and felt around the block for the leather thong. It was wrapped about a hook of sorts and it took her several long moments to unwind it and free her head. As she worked, her ears strained against the sound of his return, but the door had not open by the time she was free. She immediately came up on her knees, pushed her skirts down and glanced at the house. The Executioner was nowhere in sight, so Samantha stood and looked about for a weapon, any weapon. Her eyes fell on his axe, but she knew instantly that she would not be able to lift it, let alone swing it with any force. She took a few steps to the right, then turned and moved a few steps back the other way. She was beginning to panic all over again, when she spotted the wooden handle Wellman had been working on for a smaller, much lighter axe. She ran to it. The handle was about three feet long, but when she lifted it she knew it would have to serve. Even though it had no head on it, it was heavy, made of strong wood, oak probably. She lifted it, then moved to the far side of the main door and waited, standing just as close as she could to the house. He would have to come out the door for her to have any chance. If he went out the back and walked around the house, she knew she was lost.
She stood very quietly, her body shaking slightly, but her arms were cocked and waiting…and still waiting, but he did not emerge. She was about to move when she heard the creak of the door. She swung just before she saw him, estimating where his head would be. She was not wrong. Even though he jerked at the last moment out of reflex, the handle struck him directly across the bridge of the nose. He staggered, but did not fall back into the house as she expected, instead he took a few staggering steps out in front of her. She swung again, hitting him on the back of the head this time and finally he went down. He lay at her feet unconscious, but she swung three more times, big overhead swings like when she’d killed the bull snake in the garden. Blood was coming from the Executioner’s nose and from behind his right ear. She started to turn away but then swung two more times, hard blows but poorly aimed, striking the downed man once on the top of the head and again on the right shoulder. She immediately dropped the ax handle and considered finding a knife to make sure the Executioner was truly dead. But she was afraid to get to close to him, afraid to touch him and then her hands started to shake uncontrollably and her mind began to shut down.
She turned, refusing to look at the body at her feet and entered the house. She moved mechanically without real thought and retrieved her father’s bow, all the arrows, which amounted to three sheathes of twelve, and his hunting knife. She then bolted up the stairs to where she and Arabelle shared a room and threw as many of her clothes as she could manage onto her bed, making sure to include the heavy workpants her father allowed her to wear while working with the animals in the winter. She wrapped them all up in one of her blankets and quickly tied off the ends and hauled them all downstairs, feeling slightly ridiculous carrying such a large bundle. Next she went to the kitchen and quickly packed all the bread and salted meat she could.
When she was finished, she took a quick peek outside, but the Executioner still lay unmoving.
Her arms full, she moved to the barn and saddled Bane, their big roan. Then she threw a pair of saddlebags on Nancy, their mule, also tying the clothes and food onto the mule’s back. She quietly led them out of the barn, grabbing several canteens as she went. She filled them with water from the trough, not wanting to waste the time to pump fresh water, and glanced at the Executioner but then her eyes found her father, and sisters and began to fill with tears. She shook them clear; saddened that she would not be able to bury her family. Then her eyes fell on the large black horse nibbling at the grass which grew under the oak.
She moved to Bane and pulled out the bow. She fought the urge to kill the animal but in the end her body moved as if it had detached itself from her mind and senses. She notched an arrow, pulled it back as far as she was able, and aimed at the horse’s chest, just where it joined with the neck. Her arms were still shaking uncontrollably and she fought against the involuntary movement…wanting a clean kill.
“Forgive me,” she whispered, feeling slightly guilty though days later she would not remember anything from this morning clearly. After several seconds she finally let the arrow fly. She’d always been good with the bow, a natural shot, her father repeatedly told her, and on this occasion it was no different, despite the tremors in her arms. The arrow struck true, and the horse bolted and screamed in pain. It ran off shaking its head as it went. Samantha glanced at the Executioner. He was lying prone, still bleeding and without thinking she notched another arrow but suddenly her shaking increased.
Her mind went blank. She did not see the Executioner, did not see her dead family and without knowing how, she swung herself up on Bane and headed down the lane. Once moving she had no conscious thoughts of where she would go, her body just acted and guided the animals of its own accord.
When she got to the end of the lane, she did not use the road that led to Millvale; instead she crossed it and moved out into the field. She headed south first, before moving west toward Koshka. She was only dimly aware that she needed to avoid the Sergeant and all those men ahead of her. She had not ridden even a quarter of a mile before she was sobbing uncontrollably. Her grief was so complete that she neither knew nor cared which direction Bane headed.
