It occurred to her over again, how deep in trouble they were. They stood, without doubt, on Mican’s land. Within trees that obscured their view even as they offered cover. She could only guess at their direction.
Mican would be searching. Would he send out bands of armed men?
She could not get home, to Kendrick’s territory.
What to do?
She stumbled back into the copse to find Adair sitting up and Wen whining. She liked the look of neither. Adair had gone pale and sweaty, and she had never before seen her hound, usually so full of vitality, unable to rise.
She gave them both water, cupping some in her hands for the hound.
Crouched beside Adair, she asked, “How d’ye feel? How bad is the pain?”
“Not bad. I will be able to travel if we must.”
He lied. No need to challenge him on it.
“Mayhap,” she suggested softly, “a day of rest.”
His gaze met hers. “Bradana, we cannot stay here.”
Mican could be coming. With a band of men.
“Aye,” she said miserably. “Aye. But if Wen canna stand—”
“We will load him on one of the ponies.”
It took Adair two tries to stand. Getting him into his tunic was out of the question, so Bradana tied her own cloak around him, wrapped her harp in what was left of the blanket, and tied it to his mount.
Together they heaved Wen up and onto Bradana’s pony. They fought their way out of the copse.
Sunlight now slanted down through the boles of the trees like shafts of beneficence.
Adair, sweating heavily, stood with one hand on his pony’s shoulder and eyed the shafts of light.
“The sun rises far north at this time o’ year and to the east. I suggest we ride into it.”
She nodded. “Ye mount up.”
“But—”
“We will tak’ turns at riding.” With her pony in such poor condition, Bradana dared not load him double with Wen’s weight. “Ye for now.”
She pretended she did not notice how Adair struggled to mount up. She led the ponies first to the stream for water, and then away through the trees.
Following the light.
Throughout that day, she worried. First she worried they would be followed or that an army of men would leap out upon them from concealment in the forest. Neither happened. Then she worried for the condition of her two patients. Wen tended to slide down the pony’s back with the beast’s motion. She had to struggle and reposition him at regular intervals.
Adair…
Ah, but Adair worried her. He rode with his head bent, and she could not tell if he slept. Far too quiet, though they had an excuse for keeping quiet.
He needed food. They all did. Her own stomach had gone from sick, to aching, to sick again, and rumbled within her.
Grow used to it, she ordered herself, and kept walking. She had no intention of trading places with Adair and letting him walk, but as it was, she set a woefully slow pace. Terrifyingly, she had no idea where she was. The forest just went on and on. Still on Mican’s lands? Quite possibly.
When the sun was high overhead, they reached a stream, and Bradana paused. It took both of them to get Wen down, but when they did, he was able to stand on his feet and even wobble a step or two.
