Royal Outlaw: (Royal Outlaw, Book 1) (35 page)

“I can’t tell you.” James’s voice sounded pained.

Mariel repeated his words, unable to believe them or fully comprehend their meaning. When she had thoroughly gone over all four words and could find no hidden meaning in them, she could only come up with one thing to say: “Why not?” Her voice sounded small, weak, and vulnerable, just like how she had appeared in the mirror.

James finally looked at her. He knelt on the floor in front of her and took her hands, she did not resist. She was unable to. “When I was in Ambras Añue, zreshlans were not the only ones I saw. Anoria and I were visited by a goddess in the form of a black fox.”

No!
Mariel thought desperately.
No! The fox is a figment of my imagination. There’s no such thing as gods!

She knew James saw the panic cross her face because he reached up and tucked a loose curl behind her ear. Some part of her protested the action, but her thoughts were too caught up in fear of the Assassin and the black vixen that James claimed to see too.  

“If I tell you who the Assassin is, you will forget.”

“You don’t know that!” Mariel protested. “I forgot the other times because I saw him, but if you just tell me . . .” Her sentence trailed off as she watched James shake his head.

“I’ve seen him too, Mariel. Do you want to know why I didn’t know you were the princess? After I failed to find information on the new heir in the capital, I saw the monster who wants to kill you. I watched him murder my contact, Anna. I fled the kingdom in terror. I’m not surprised you forgot—I wish I could. But it is important for you to remember.”

“No!” Mariel hissed, managing to keep her voice low when she remembered the presence of guards outside the door. She shoved James’s hands away from her and launched over the arm of the couch to her feet.

“Narel said you will die if you don’t remember. You will go mad first and then you will die.”

“Narel doesn’t
exist
. She’s a goddess, and gods are just figments of people’s imagination.”

“Then how do I know about the black fox?”

“I told you. I told you after the last assassination attack. You said I was muttering about a black fox and I told you it was a vixen.”

“You’re reaching for excuses. The gods are real.”

“Then if Narel is real, and she is the goddess of protection, why is there an assassin trying to kill me?”

James’s face darkened. “I’d like to know that too.” He rose to his feet and started to approach Mariel. “We aren’t here to debate the existence of gods. You need to remember what happened with the Assassin—both times.”

“I’d rather debate about gods.”

“You need to face your past.”

“Just tell me who the Assassin is.”

“It won’t make a difference.”

“Yes it will. I’ll know who to look out for.”

“I guarantee that you would know him even if I didn’t tell you. You need to remember.”

Mariel backed away from James as he approached. Her body shook with fear. She had spent nearly twelve years keeping the events of her mother’s murder locked away. Not one day had gone by since the assassination attempt at the convent that she did not think about it.

“I know it’s hard,” James said soothingly. “I’ll help you.”

“I don’t want to remember.”

“If you want to live, you need to.”

“I can’t.”

“Have you tried?”

“No, and I won’t.”

“Be brave.”

“I’m not a coward! I’m not scared of anything!”

“Then remember.”

“No.”

“Please!”

“No! I can’t.”

“What happened after your mother tucked you into bed at Remel?”

She smelled the stench of rotting flesh and cringed. In her mind she could see brown recluse spiders climbing up grey robes.

“
No!
” she repeated, shoving the glimpse of memories away. “I can’t. I can’t.”

“Calm down, you can do this.”

“No.”

Mariel jolted in surprise when she backed into the wall near the balcony, she restrained a scream.

“You have two gaps in your memories. You need to remember what happened.”

She thought about the memories she did remember, the ones Guardsman Cowart had unknowingly unlocked that night in the tavern.

“Don’t remember! Don’t remember!”

But she could not forget those memories. She remembered the terror and loneliness she had felt, the feeling of being hunted, although she could not remember who hunted her. She remembered how it felt to be thrown out into the cold as the last bit of hope was snuffed out. And the worst thing she remembered was the feel of that knife in her hand as she drove it into the chest of the man.

“I killed a man,” Mariel whispered, her mind transported to the courtyard of Remel long ago.

“You’ve killed people before,” James told her, obviously not sure what she was talking about. “You’ve fought in the Dremien war before and you’ve been attacked by all sorts of people and creatures.”

Tears trickled down her cheeks as she looked at her friend with a haunted expression. “I killed a man when I was six. I didn’t know what I was doing. I don’t know why I had a knife, but I did. It was a great, big kitchen knife. A man tried to grab me off the horse. I was scared. I plunged the knife into his neck. He didn’t expect it, so he didn’t move. I killed him. I killed him!”

The control she had fought to perfect over the years broke. Mariel began to sob in horror of the act she had committed so young, and in fear of what else had happened in the events that surrounded her first killing. She was only vaguely aware when James folded her in his arms and let her cry into his chest. He kissed her lightly on top of her head.

“Shhh, it’s okay. You’re okay.”

“I was six!”

“You acted in self-defense.”

“I didn’t know what I was doing!” Her voice was muffled against his chest and her tears.

“He was a bad man.”

“Bad,” she muttered. “Bad? He’s the only clear thing I can remember. Killing him.”

“This is why you need to remember, Mariel.”

“No.”

“You need to know what happened.”

“I can’t.”

“You need to accept it and move on.”

“Stop it!”

Mariel shoved James away from her.

“Stop it!”

She screamed the words. It was only when she heard the movement in the corridor that she came back to the present and remembered her guards.

The four men barged into her room with swords drawn and eyes alert. Mariel stared at them for a moment as she fought to regain her control. James was gone, he had vanished into the darkness of the room, no doubt in his serpent form, although Mariel had not seen him shape-shift, or even move.

The guards looked around the room, prepared to strike, but all they could see was Mariel in her nightdress. The shadows concealed her face and her tears, which she was grateful for. Anger that she could not have a private conversation without being interrupted by people trying to protect her finally brought her back to her senses.

“You pass.” Mariel tried to lace her voice with amusement, but it still shook. “I was just testing you to see if you would respond if I needed you.” She made a shooing motion. “You can go back to your dawdling in the corridor.”

“Humph!” The tall, dark-skinned man, who had never hesitated to show his distaste for the princess, sheathed his sword and retreated to the hallway. Two of the other guards were quick to follow him, but Tristan was not so easily dissuaded.

“What’s wrong?”

Mariel wanted to wipe the tears from her cheeks to destroy the evidence, but she knew the motion would betray her.

“I told you, it was a test.” The quaver was barely detectable in her voice, but she had trained Tristan well, maybe a little too well. He noticed.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

Tristan walked toward her slowly with his sword in hand. She saw his eyes flick around the room trying to see into the shadows.

“Who’s here?”

“No one.”

“
Liar
.”

Facing opposition helped calm Mariel. “I lie a lot, and you believe me half the time. You’re no judge.”

“You yelled ‘stop it’ to someone and you sounded upset.”

This is what happened when the pupil turned the teacher’s tricks on the teacher. Was this how Darren felt when she tricked him or saw through his bluffs?

“I’m supposed to sound upset. It’s part of the act.” Her voice no longer shook.

“Liar.”

Tristan sheathed his sword and narrowed his eyes at Mariel as he passed through the light of the fire.

“We’ve been over this before.”  

He strode directly to her and stopped right in front of her. It was when he was close that he saw it: the dampness on her cheeks. Alarm crossed his face. He had never seen anything make her cry.

“I’m a great actress aren’t I?” Mariel was reaching and she knew it. “Do you think that will help me be a good princess?”

“Who’s here?” This time Mariel heard fear in
his
voice.

“No one.”

He repeated the question.

“Look around. Do you see anyone?”

Something snapped inside of the huge man. It was fear. Fear that the Assassin was in the room and Mariel was too scared to admit it. Tristan slammed her against the wall next to the doors of the balcony.

“Who’s here?”

His massive body kept her pinned tightly with no way to move.

“Who’s here?”

He shook her, slamming her head painfully against the wall in his desperation to make her answer him, to admit that the Assassin was here, that he had been hurting her. But now it was Tristan who was hurting her, as his large hands gripped her on her shoulders and accidentally pressed against her windpipe.

Mariel could not breathe. She struggled to convey this to her frightened friend, but there was not enough light for him to see her and he misinterpreted her struggles as attempts to fight him off. Brilliant colors filled her vision along with stars that danced in spectacular formations.

“That’s not very nice,” said a soft, angry voice.

The large hands released her just enough that she could draw air. She gulped and saw the knife pressed against Tristan’s throat. Using the advantage of the dark, Tristan slowly drew his arm up to his throat. Throwing his strength into the motion he forcefully pulled the hand holding the knife away from his throat and twisted.

James dropped the knife, but did not allow Tristan to gain the advantage. The darkness and the quickness of the serpentramel’s movements made it impossible to see what happened. The next thing Mariel knew her two friends were on the floor, fighting.

Mariel stood dumbly as the men wrestled. Her mind functioned slowly and she thought it bizarre that Tristan and James were fighting each other, both thinking they were protecting her. She tried to remember if there had ever been a time when two men had fought over her, and failed to think of even one. She decided it was not something she liked.

Tristan was larger and stronger, but he was no match for James’s speed and impeccable training. Mariel heard a grunt of pain from Tristan at the same moment the door burst open and the other three guards entered the room at a charge. James turned to meet them, but with the light of the fire revealing his face to the guards, the tall dark-skinned man stopped short and stared, while the other two continued to run at him.

The flash of firelight reflected in the two guards’ drawn swords registered with Mariel and she overcame her shock. “Stop!” she cried. “Stop now!”

Everyone in the room froze and stared at her.

She knew she needed to speak, to say something that would not reveal the turmoil of her emotions. She let the mask of command slide across her face. “Put your swords away,” she ordered the guards and then crouched next to Tristan who proved to be awake, although a steady flow of blood poured from his nose.

“Do you have a handkerchief?” she asked James as she helped Tristan sit up. “He thought you were the Assassin.”

James snorted. “In that case, he didn’t do a very good job protecting you.”

“Shut your mouth and give me that handkerchief.”

James held out his handkerchief and she took it from him and gave it to Tristan.

“You know hib?” The large man asked in astonishment as he pinched his nose with the cloth in an effort to stem the flow of blood.

Her heart beat frantically, but she was glad for the distraction the guards provided. She did not want to go back to the conversation she and James had been having.

“He’s been annoying me for years, but I wasn’t aware that a person could die of annoyance, although James would have a good shot of killing someone that way.”

“Glad you appreciate my company,” James said, but she could hear the smile in his voice.