Chapter 7
As Ren sheathed his weapon, the grizzled veteran snorted. “What did you think you were going to do with that sword?” he demanded harshly. “If someone is close enough to have a chat with you by the time you see them, it’s a little late to think about fighting.”
His good eye darted to Kathryn’s startled, pale face, and he bowed in her direction. “Princess,” he said briefly.
“General Brenin,” she replied faintly.
He really came. It felt like an answer to prayer. Ren wouldn’t have to fight alone from here on out.
“Just Brenin will do, princess. I’m not a general anymore. They’re close on your tail, in case you were wondering.” He turned to Ren with a frustrated face. “I thought I told you, you can’t protect anyone if you let yourself get hurt.”
“I…I’m sorry, sir,” Ren stammered.
“It’s done now. You’ll have to take the princess towards the castle. I’ll slow down your pursuers. Go carefully. You can’t afford any accidents.”
He pulled his horse around to leave, but Ren blocked him. “Wait! What about Prince Illian? Isn’t he able to help?”
Brenin glared at him. “Prince Illian is already making his way back to Iridalys. He has no intention of helping.”
“What happened to Dena?” Kathryn asked sharply. Her eyes widened with fear as a terrible thought struck her. “Is Dena all right? Has she been arrested?”
Brenin hesitated, then growled, “There’s nothing you can do for her now.”
“She’s dead?” Ren exclaimed in horror.
“They arrested her. She’s being held for interrogation at the castle. You won’t be able to get to her. The most you can do is get back to Iridalys and demand her release. Now, get going!”
“You can’t take them on alone,” Ren protested.
Brenin snorted. “I would probably do a better job than you did. But that doesn’t matter. Keep your eyes on your one goal, remember? Like I always taught you. Keep the princess safe.”
He shoved him aside, and Ren helplessly watched him fade into the trees. Kathryn put a hand on Ren’s arm. “We have to go,” she said gently.
He bit his lip and nodded. “Right.”
They rode for hours. Thankfully, Navinor had many small brooks and lakes, and Ren led the horses through all of them to mask their scent in case they were pursued by dogs. For every hour, they walked ten minutes to rest the horses. Kathryn grew more and more exhausted as the strain from her ordeal began to show, but Ren seemed surprisingly strong despite his wound.
Eventually, Kathryn dismounted to walk, and her legs collapsed under her. Ren caught her. “You’d better keep riding, princess,” he said worriedly.
“No,” she panted. “It’ll hurt Ivory.”
“It’s okay; use my horse. He’s used to carrying me, so you’ll be nothing in comparison. You can switch between the horses, and I’ll walk,” Ren told her.
Cursing her own weakness, Kathryn complied, and they kept going until the sun disappeared and the moon shined down on them.
When they finally stopped to rest, they didn’t dare light a fire, even though the cold air left them shivering as they huddled close together with the horses.
Ren put an arm around her and pulled her close, his warmth helping ease her trembling. He remarked, “I’m surprised we haven’t seen any Vipers. I didn’t think we’d get this much of a lead on them.”
The words thudded into Kathryn’s brain like arrows as she realized their significance. “I think that’s on purpose,” she said slowly.
Ren frowned. “What do you mean?”
“They have probably guessed that the most likely course of action for us would be to go home. So while we were taking detours to go through brooks and hide our scent, they will go as fast as they can to put a wall between us and Iridalys. So you won’t see any of them until probably tomorrow, at which point we will likely start running into patrols of four or five. If I were them, I would have four to keep you busy while the other one runs to tell the rest where we are, and then they will tighten the net.” Kathryn looked up at the stars as she spoke. An idea struck her. Maybe it was crazy, but it was also probably the only option left.
Ren thought about her words. “Right. So what do we do?” he asked again.
And this time, finally, Kathryn had an answer. She glanced at him. “We break through the net.”
Prince Gregory was enraged. Everything had been going so well until that bodyguard decided to throw himself and his princess out of a window.
Worse still, General Xian had failed to stop the bodyguard from escaping. Wounding him was not enough. He should have been carved into a dozen pieces, Gregory thought bitterly. While the prince didn’t particularly feel that his plans were being threatened, he did feel inconvenienced. And there was very little that angered him more than being inconvenienced.
But at least Gregory had the full support of the Navinorian King. His father was heartbroken upon hearing of the death of his youngest son and immediately dispatched Gregory, Xian, and a large number of Protectors to hunt down the offenders.
Now, Gregory sat in a tent, looking at a map and contemplating his strategy. General Xian said, “My lord. I can overtake them myself and kill him.”
Gregory glared at him. “You failed once already. This time, I’m leaving no such chances.”
Xian lowered his head. “Your highness, my failure was that I did not know he had no honor. If he had remained to finish the duel, I would have killed him.”
Gregory laughed bitterly. “Of course he has no honor. He may be a nobleman, but he thinks and behaves like a peasant. I would almost rather not kill him. I would prefer to torture him. It would be a simple way to get a confession out of her royal highness, and it would give me some satisfaction for the trouble he’s caused. But he might be too dangerous for that.”
“The only thing that’s odd to me is that they haven’t run into any of our scouting parties yet,” the captain of the Protectors observed.
“It is peculiar,” Gregory agreed. “They should have started seeing them this morning, even at the slow pace they seemed to be going. Though perhaps it’s not so peculiar, and the cause is simply the overwhelming incompetence of your men.”
“Maybe they stopped to rest,” General Xian suggested.
Gregory glared at him. “Don’t be ridiculous. They know there’s no time for rest with the Protectors on their trail.”
“Unless…princess Kathryn is said to have a strategic mind that rivals that of her brother,” the captain said thoughtfully. “Is it at least possible she chose to do something unexpected? For example, she might go to Tephraya.”
Gregory shook his head. “Into exile? Her pride won’t let her do that. And she would have no one to help her there. No, she will try to go home. And we will intercept her at the border as planned.”
Ren and Kathryn decided to rest through most of the night. Kathryn’s plan depended on allowing the horses to recover.
Both horses were bred for a perfect balance of speed and stamina. By contrast, Navinorian mounts were famously bred almost exclusively for stamina and bearing loads. So Kathryn decided to use this to her advantage.
“We’ll allow the horses to graze and completely recover,” she told Ren. “We’ll also try to get the swelling down in your shoulder. Then in a few hours, we’ll make directly for the border. We will probably hit at least one of their patrols. You’ll fight them and take two of their horses so we can alternate and save ours as much as possible. And as they try to converge, we’ll outpace them. If they do catch up, we’ll simply rely on our faster mounts to escape; we must not stop to fight under any circumstances. Once we reach the border, we’ll head directly to Trista’s castle.” Trista was a good and loyal friend of Kathryn’s who would gladly provide them with fresh mounts. “We’ll get supplies there. Then we’ll go straight home without resting. It will be hard, but we’ll manage it.”
“Sounds all right to me,” Ren said cheerfully. He was relieved to see she was thinking clearly once again. And her plan involved at least one fight, which made him even happier. Not to mention, he shouldn’t have to face off with General Xian.
Kathryn tapped his shoulder. “One more thing,” she said quietly. “Things often go wrong in plans like this.”
“Which you know from your vast battlefield experience?” he teased her.
“I’m being serious, Ren. If we do run into Xian, don’t fight him. Run away.”
Ren bristled. “I can beat him,” he protested, though the words sounded hollow even to him.
“Our goal is not to worsen the situation, remember? So you’d have to fight him while trying not to kill him. And you and I both know you don’t have that luxury with him,” Kathryn said quietly.
Ren considered that. “I suppose it might be hard if I’m trying to play nice. Fine, then. I won’t fight him.”
He glanced down and suddenly noticed Kathryn still wore her wedding ring. That put a new thought in his head. He asked, “How exactly did Lorrin die?”
She flinched and turned ashen. He mentally scolded himself for asking, but she spoke calmly. “The moment we arrived in his room, he drank some wine that was waiting for him. And he seemed a little different…maybe drunk. And then all of a sudden he collapsed.” She followed his gaze and when her eyes fell on the ring, she reddened and pulled it off quickly, tossing it away into the undergrowth.
Ren was relieved that the account held no room for what he had feared most, but he tried very hard not to show it. “I see. Well, it makes sense. I guess Gregory left the wine there. The only thing that’s odd to me is he was risking you drinking it, which would sort of ruin his scapegoat plan…unless he knew you can’t drink wine.”
Kathryn frowned. “That didn’t occur to me,” she admitted, sounding a little ashamed of the fact.
“No reason it should’ve,” Ren said hastily. “Everything was pretty hectic.” He burned to ask a particular question, but he held himself back.
“So he probably had a spy even in Iridalys nobility,” Kathryn reflected.
Ren couldn’t help but wonder how she felt about Lorrin’s death. Even if he was rude and overbearing, perhaps some part of her was a little sad. The man was her fiance, after all.
He tried to keep his voice casual as he said, “Well, at least you don’t have to marry him now, right? One good thing came out of all this.”
Kathryn shrugged. “I suppose that’s true. He was a cad in every sense of the word. Disrespectful and obnoxious, and I am only glad I never had to get into bed with him.” She gave him a sideways glance and said, a little sharply, “Did you think I felt differently?”
Ren was ashamed once more. “No, I…nevermind,” he mumbled.
The silence between them became awkward. Eventually Ren broke it with, “There’s one thing I’ve been wondering. Why isn’t Illian doing anything to help?”
“Because he doesn’t care,” Kathryn said briefly.
“He must care a little bit. Even just for old times sake,” Ren argued.
Kathryn shrugged. “Have it your way then. He cares and just can’t help us because it might start a war.”
Ren didn’t like her tone, but he also didn’t know quite how to retort. So instead he said, “The only problem with all this is there’s too little action, and we’re just hanging around and waiting.”
“We need the rest,” Kathryn reminded him. “Especially you.” Evidently, she was worried about his wound.
She reached out her hand to check his temperature and he caught it. “Nothing to worry about, Kat,” he said cheerfully.
“Your arm is bothering you. You’ve been favoring it, and you have a fever.”
“It’s all right. I’ll be perfectly fine once we’re home and I can get some proper rest.” He squeezed her hand gently. “We’ll make it out, Kat. I promise.”
Kathryn looked up at him and smiled for the first time. “Of course we will.”
But Ren’s heart was heavy. He wondered if Dena was still alive. Every second of delay made it less likely. But the moment they were back in Iridalys, Kathryn would undoubtedly insist upon her release. And they would prove their innocence somehow. Then the nightmare would be over.
Gregory was getting impatient. There was still no word of the princess and her bodyguard. They seemed to have disappeared, though the Protectors had been searching for hours. He wondered if they might have made their way past the scouts somehow. And then, at long last, one of the Protectors came into the tent and said, “Your highness, we found them near Derano Ridge.”
“Perfect,” Gregory said coldly. “Send our fastest messengers to all the Protectors in the area. Xian, mount up.”
The Protector said, “Um, sir, the thing is… we weren’t able to delay them.”
Gregory’s eyes burned. “What do you mean?”
“Well…they just wanted the horses, it seemed. The bodyguard just knocked a couple of us off our mounts, grabbed the reins, and went on. They didn’t even pause. Two of our other patrols got hit by an unknown assailant as well. This one is particularly stealthy and dangerous, though. He knocked them out cold one by one and stole their horses. We’ve yet to identify him.”
Gregory slammed his fist down on the small table in front of him. Xian cocked his head, considering this strange news. “General Ren is running away?” he mumbled to himself.
Gregory snapped, “Of course he is. Their plan is to break through directly. There’s not a moment to lose; we have to intercept them!”
Xian stood up, clumped over to the map, and tapped a spot on it. “We’re at an angle,” he said briefly.
Gregory glared at him. “Your point?”
“We won’t reach them.” He traced a line from their position to where Derano Ridge stood. Then from the ridge to the border. “If they go straight, they get there first.”
“Then we’ll capture them in Iridalys.” Gregory stood up. “They’ll be exhausted by then, and they’ll have to slow down. Let’s get moving! Now!”
Kathryn was worried about Ren. He had dispatched the Vipers without any real difficulty, and he seemed to be doing all right, except that his face was still hot and flushed. And as he rode, he shifted constantly, trying to ease the discomfort in his shoulder. But at least they were making excellent time as they switched between horses.
They ran across another group of five Vipers. As Kathryn expected, one of them broke off from the group while the other four galloped towards Ren and Kathryn.
The two of them urged their horses on faster. They were excellent riders, and they pulled ahead rapidly.
Out of the corner of her eye, Kathryn saw a blue flash. She cried, “Ren, look out!”
He bent low over his horse’s neck to avoid the azura dagger. “You missed!” he yelled back over his shoulder triumphantly. He pulled his horse behind Kathryn’s so there was no risk of her getting hit by the daggers, but they were already out of range. “It’s working!” Ren called to her.
Kathryn was a bit superstitious and didn’t feel he should have said that. After all, Xian might appear at any time. But to her surprise, they crossed the border an hour later without ever running into Xian.
They slowed the horses, and Ren remarked, “That went strangely well. To your friend’s place next, right?”
“Yes. Hopefully, she’ll be willing to take us in.”
They were greeted outside by Lady Trista, who ran to throw her arms around her friend. “Princess Kathryn!” she exclaimed. “What’s happened to you? What are you wearing? Why is General Ren injured? What-”
Kathryn held up her hand to stop the flow of words. “We’ll talk later,” she said. “Right now, we need fresh horses, food, and water.”
“Of course! Come along; my people will take care of your mounts.”
Exhausted and overwhelmed by the wild race to safety, Kathryn submitted to being led inside, stumbling at every step. As much as she hated to involve Trista, Ren needed care. And if they didn’t get at least a little rest, she would too.
What would Prince Gregory do next? Surely he wouldn’t follow them this far.
Would he?
Loyalty Fallen Hub 