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bsp; Carpathian Mountains
THOUGH LADA WANTED TO get her business with Matthias done as quickly as possible, there was one stop she had to make on the way.
“Where are we going?” Oana asked.
“Detour.” Lada directed them up a mountain pass that had been patiently carved by a tributary stream. The land was unforgiving, no clear path showing their way. But they had not made it very far before a woman emerged from behind a clump of trees, crossbow pointed right at Lada.
“My prince!” the woman said, lowering the crossbow.
Lada nodded to her. The guard went ahead of their company, alerting several other women posted on watch. Lada was pleased to see they had not relaxed their discipline in maintaining a lookout.
When they arrived at the camp, everything was clean and orderly. There were more than a thousand women here, those too old to fight or pregnant. They shared care of the children. It was one of three such camps, but Lada suspected it was the best one. Makeshift tents huddled between trees, each with a carefully cleared fire pit in front. A group of several hundred children sat in a meadow as women leaned over them, pointing to things.
Daciana smiled with unfeigned delight. “Lada! We did not expect you.”
“It was on my way.” Lada dismounted, peering past the nearest children to see what they were doing. Each child had a small stick and was scratching in the dirt with it. It was an odd game.
“We are learning how to read and write.” Daciana pointed to the nearest woman. “Maria teaches us the letters at night, and then during the day we teach the children.” Daciana’s face glowed with pride. “I know the entire alphabet now. I am working on writing a letter to Stefan.”
Lada was impressed. Though she should not have been particularly surprised. Of course the women would not be lounging about, idling away their hours. Wallachian women worked from birth until death. Even here, hiding in the mountains, they were finding ways to improve their children’s lives.
“Walk with me.” Lada turned and Daciana followed. She was beginning to show, starting to look more like when Lada had first met her, fierce and defiant, on the lands of the boyar who had impregnated her.
Lada looked up at the branches laced together. Though spring came later in the mountains, the trees were all budding. The spring green was almost gold. Little tufts of treasure on each of Lada’s trees. Had any spring ever been this lovely anywhere else? Breathing deeply and feeling herself grow stronger for it, Lada spoke. “Tell me how things are here.”
“Everything is going as well as can be expected. We have rationed the stores and should be able to stay for several more months if needed. We supplement everything with game we catch, though we are ranging farther to set traps. But the women in charge are careful and have not come across anyone else. How are things in the country?”
“We had a chance to win. But the Basarabs betrayed me.”
Daciana spit. “Boyars.”
“Yes. But the Ottomans left anyway.”
Daciana’s answering smile was as pointed and brutal as one of Lada’s stakes. She had been one of the biggest supporters of Lada’s Tirgoviste plans. A few of the men had balked at the idea of doing that to the bodies. But Daciana knew what it took to survive. And she had agreed with Lada. They were already dead—why not use them for a loftier purpose? “Mehmed did not like his welcome, then.”
“Not at all.” Lada stopped, turning to face Daciana. “Did you know Stefan is leaving me?”
Daciana had the grace not to pretend. She nodded, no fear or apology in her face. “It was not my idea.”
“But you will go with him.”
“I would follow that man to the ends of the earth.”
Lada felt a stab of pain. Nicolae had once said something similar to her. And now he was in the earth, and she was losing her friends one by one. That missing feeling clutched her as hard and suddenly as she clutched her locket.
Daciana reached out for Lada’s hand. Lada did not offer it. Daciana grasped her shoulder, instead. “I will miss being the lady’s maid to the oddest lady I have ever known.”
Lada turned to walk back to the camp. “I do not need one. I will be fine.” She hurried so Daciana would not be walking beside her. She had braced herself for a fight, or for anger if Daciana had tried to lie to her. She had not prepared herself to be so…sad.
She found her horse and rode away without bidding Daciana goodbye. Oana, slower to get her horse up the difficult path, had only just arrived at the camp. She grumbled about turning her horse around.
Lada still had her. She did not need Daciana.
But it was not quite the same. Daciana was a young woman, nearly Lada’s own age. A companion of her own sex was something Lada had never had before Daciana. She had never realized she needed it—enjoyed it, even—until faced with its absence.
The ache inside her was aggravating. She had found strength in her friends, but the cost of losing them was increasingly high. How had she not learned this lesson yet? Between Radu and Mehmed, even starting as far back as her father, surely her heart should have known better than to allow anyone a place.
She would close her heart.
