“Thank you, Aleksandr,” her father said.“Youbrought my daughter back to me.”
“You are most welcome, your majesty,” Aleksianswered with a dip of his head.“Though it was not all my doing.Princess Sahar kept herself alive while captive to the Wolf and hiscurs until I could help free her.It was she who killed Taweel theTall while saving my skin.”
“Of course she did,” the king chuckled.Heruffled Sahar’s hair, hair that Aleksi had been running his fingersthrough this morning.Then the king cupped her chin and held hergaze.“Are you… Did they?”
“No,” Sahar shook her head and gave herfather a reassuring smile.“They didn’t.”
“Not for lack of trying, it seems.”The kingreached up and touched the purple and yellow swelling on herforehead.
“They starved me, beat me, and threatened medaily with rape,” she said, and Aleksi’s chest was not the only onerumbling.“They were saving me for the Ox, so he could publiclyrape me and whip me before killing me, all to get his war againstyou.”
The king growled.“I should have killed thatcowardly pollution of a man twenty years ago.”He hugged her close.“I am so sorry you had to suffer because I didn’t.”
“I survived, Father.My wounds will heal,though the Wolf’s may not.”
Her father cocked his head.
“Aleksi knifed Yago in the belly,” she said.“Yago fled like the coward he is and left Taweel to his fate.TheWolf may be dead or dying along the road somewhere.”
“If he is,” Brawn spoke up, “I’ll find him.Odds are, he’ll make for the nearest city two days’ ride south andwest of here.”
“Which is ruled by the Crow, allied to theOx,” her father said.He looked to Sahar.“Was the Wolf expectingto meet up with anyone else?”
She shook her head.“I never heard them speakof it.They only talked of taking me straight to the Ox.”
Her father and Brawn exchanged glances.“Ifhe makes it to the Crow,” her father said, “they’ll be watchingeveryone coming and going from the city.”
“I expect they will.”Brawn’s brown eyesglinted with the challenge.“Farid, Matin,” he singled out two ofthe six guards, both of them of medium height and unremarkablelooks, as long as a person didn’t look too closely, much like heruncle Brawn.“You’ll be coming with me.We leave at dawn.”
Later, Sahar sat beside her father and sortedout clean strips of linen to bind Aleksi’s shoulder wound as Brawnand the two guards going after Yago made their preparations.Theywere to bring him or his body back if found, and if not, to go intothe Crow’s city and ferret out what information they could beforereturning home.Another of the guards stoked the camp’s fire wherea pot of water was set to boil as the fourth laid out a quick mealof cheese and dates and dried meat.The other two guards sat watchaway from the camp.
Her father peeled away the blood-stainedbandages Sahar had wrapped around Aleksi’s wound two days ago asthe guard set the pot of boiling water down alongside them.Theking, a learned healer, dipped a wash rag into the water and rubbeda dab of soap into it.He began to gently wash the reddened skinaround the wound, working his way to the blood-crusted hole, anddid not speak until everyone else was out of earshot.
“You tended to Aleksi’s wound, mydaughter?”
“I did.”
“You have done well.I see no infection andthe skin is already knitting together.”
“I did as you taught me, Father.”
He nodded as he rinsed the rag and rubbedmore soap onto it.“It helps to have such a fine, strong young manas a patient, does it not?”
She flicked a quick glance at Aleksi, and sawthe muscle in his clamped jaw tick.“Yes,” she said.“It does.”Before her father could say more, she added rashly, “I would sayhis wound is worth one hundred gold pieces, wouldn’t you?”
Her father’s hand stilled mid-air.Aleksi metand held the king’s accusatory glare without flinching.
“So much for your word of honor,” the kingsaid, resuming bathing Aleksi’s wound a little less gently thanbefore.
Aleksi said nothing.
“It was the Wolf who gave your secret away,”she told her father, not even trying to hide the disappointment shefelt that he had not trusted her to be able to take care of herselfand shrugging off the fact that he’d proved to be right.Even agrown man such as himself would have been at the cur’s mercy underthe same circumstances.“One of Yago’s spies saw you coming out ofAleksi’s room the night before the race.”
“His spy would not have known what was spokenbetween me and Aleksandr,” the king said, still eyeing Aleksi.“Nobody but he and I could know that.”
“The Wolf is, was, many things,” she addedstubbornly, “but stupid is not one of them.He knew enough to puttwo and two together.”
Still, her father eyed Aleksi.
