AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Devil be damned, they stomped behind me for a while as I headed north with a slight limp in every other step. Toward home… or away from it?
My throat narrowed.
It didn’t matter.
What good was keeping a promise if I died trying to fulfill it? A mule and provisions. A waxed, hooded cloak. A scarf to hide my face for good measure. That was all I needed to prepare for my journey to the Pale Court. Maybe three days of rest for my shoulder—
Thud. Thud.
Thud, thud, thud.
I turned back.
Panic surged, freezing my legs in place as I stared over the motionless corpses littering the ground.
They’d captured Enosh.
Crouching behind barrels,I waited in the shroud of darkness, listening to the once familiar bellow of Hemdale’s night guard as he called the hour and lit the few oil lamps. His voice faded into the thick fog lingering between the buildings, making room for the rapidba-boomof my heart.
Three.
Two.
Now!
I slinked around the barrels and hurried steps carried me up the cobblestone. It changed into seashells crunching beneath my thinning soles as I snuck around my home and hushed into the shrubs beneath the window.
Snores came from behind the shutters. I pushed a twig through the gap and disabled the lock behind them. Hinges creaked when I opened the shutters, and I reached up in search of hold on the window’s frame. Since my arm still hung limp and numb, it took several attempts to reach the sill. Once I did, I wiggled myself inside, ribs grinding along hard wood before my hip caught on it. I hit the wooden planks a breath later. Pain flared to life across my body once more, putting the ache around the blisters on my feet to shame.
Still, the snoring continued, and I patted the table down for a candle. Red embers guided me toward the hearth, where I lit the wick, letting a flame cast nervous flickers about the room. My handloom took up a large part of it, and I carefully worked around it toward Pa’s bed.
My nose caught a whiff of musty straw, so foreign after two months of the softest pelts keeping me warm. Something inside me revolted. Everything smelled wrong; the air I breathed so void of the familiarity of ash sprinkled over snow, it sunk my heart. Would they burn Enosh at the stake?
My head shook on its own.
There was no point pondering it.
In the end, Enosh would be alive.
Though I might not end so lucky.
I kneeled beside Pa’s bed, palm suspended above his mouth in case he screamed. “Pa.” When he smacked his wrinkled lips but otherwise didn’t rouse, I tried again. “Pa. Wake up. It’s me… Ada.”
He shot up with a groan, clutching his patched-up quilt. I hadn’t needed to worry about him screaming. He pressed the quilt to his mouth, letting the wool muffle a violent cough that shook the tousled white strands at the top of his head. With it came the scent of blood, like a rusty nail warmed between one’s fingers.
I brought the candle closer, letting the dim light cast across the many dark red spots that dappled the linen atop the straw. My stomach hardened.
It had gotten worse.
So much worse.
“Ada…”
Pa’s voice, muffled beneath layers of bloody phlegm, brought my eyes to his. “We have to be quiet or the night guard will find me.”
“Oh, child…” His blood-stained lips trembled, his eyes glassy. “Where have you been? What happened to your face? For days, we sent riders to search for the mule, but they never… never found you, and…” When his eyes narrowed on my neck, I suddenly remembered that I still wore my collar. “What in the name of Helfa is that?”
“Shh, I’ll tell you everything.” Even if I didn’t know how. “First, I’ll heat some water, then get a rag and strong alcohol for my wounds. But…” I peeled my shredded dress away from my badly bruised shoulder, “I’ll need your help with this. You have to push it back, like I saw you do once with William.”
