The Silvered (14 page)

Her own face as expressionless as she could make it, Danika
remained passive in the grip of the enemy, walking between them because being dragged would accomplish nothing but leave her less able to fight when the time came.

“Sarge! These wet skirts weigh a fucking ton! Can we strip them down?” The shout came from behind, from one of the soldiers charged with keeping Jesine on her feet.

“You can stop bellyaching and put some effort in!” Sergeant Black called from the shore.

“Effort, he says,” muttered the soldier on her right as he half guided, half dragged Danika forward another step. “Didn’t see him crossing at the same pace as the prisoners. My balls have climbed so far up into my body they’re sitting on my shoulder.”

“Shut up, Murphy, you fool!” snapped the soldier on her left. “She can understand you.”

“What’s she going to do, Tagget? Tell the sergeant on me?” Murphy’s grip tightened and he shoved her down until the water that had been up to her chest slapped against her face. “You’re not going to say anything, are you, sweetheart?” he murmured as he pulled her upright again.

Coughing, Danika fought to get her feet back under her, helped by Tagget’s arm around her waist. When she could speak again, she turned her head to the left and nodded as graciously as her position allowed. “Thank you.” Murphy, she ignored.

Then there were hands reaching down from the bank, and she was hauled up and left to lie on dry ground while the others were pulled from the water. For the last few weeks, as her body adjusted to pregnancy, she’d been too hot, but now, in cold, wet clothing, her teeth started to chatter. A warm body rolled up against her back, and Jesine whispered, “I can still control my temperature. Maybe it’ll help.”

It didn’t make her less wet or less cold, but it did help.

“If there’s a breeze,” Danika told her, lips barely moving, “it carries sound both to and from, but I have no control.”

“Seems we’re first level again. Stina should force the rockweed into bloom.”

“What…”

“Allergies.” Jesine’s tone made it clear her teeth were showing. “Might as well make them as uncomfortable as possible until the Pack arrives.”

“Shut up!”

The wet wool of her skirts absorbed most of Murphy’s kick and, as it was Tagget who hauled her to her feet, Danika allowed herself to be hauled, teeth gritted against the growing pain in her shoulders.

“Come on, get up, you great bloody cow!”

The soldiers lifting Stina were handling her a lot less neutrally, grunting and cursing at her weight and grabbing both breasts and buttocks as they maneuvered her upright. When she jerked away, calling them names, it was probably just as well for her safety they didn’t understand. One of them reached inside her open jacket to pinch a nipple, visible through wet shirtwaist and chemise.

“You lay with beasts, don’cha? You should be grateful for a bit of human touching.”

“Enough.” The lieutenant sounded bored. “We haven’t time for that nonsense. Get them moving.” He peered westward, eyes slitted against the late afternoon sun. “This is taking too long. We’re following our own tracks out. We know exactly where we’re going. We should have been able to make it over the border and meet up with the wagons before dark.”

“We won’t be able to manage that, sir.”

“I know that, Sergeant! That’s why I said
should
.” He sighed, as though he carried the weight of the world on his shoulders. “Fine. Then we need to reach the camp before dark.”

“The camp, sir?”

“The place where we camped on the way in, Sergeant. I want to leave as little indication of our passage as possible.”

“Sir, the beastmen track by scent. It doesn’t matter where we make camp for the night.”

“Then we make it where we…” The lieutenant frowned. “…where we made it.”

“Yes, sir.”

Danika bit her lip at the sergeant’s tone, fighting the rise of hysterical giggles.

Lieutenant Geurin turned his frown on her, as if he sensed her reaction. “The beastmen close enough to track us,” he said, his words meant for the sergeant but spoken to her, “are being dealt with by the Imperial army. If there are others, either beast or mage, they’re both too far away. Get them moving, Sergeant Black.”

“Yes, sir. You heard the lieutenant.” His voice was a nearly familiar growl. Danika bit her lip harder. “Keep them on their feet, keep them moving. And Kyne?”

“Sergeant?” The soldier who’d assaulted Stina now had one hand tucked up into her armpit, waiting for the man on the other side to take his place.

“Keep your hands to yourself.”

“Ah, she doesn’t mind, Sarge. Do you?” As he leaned in, Stina reared back and slammed her forehead down onto his nose.

The next thing Danika knew, Stina was on the ground and Kyne had both hands clamped to his face, blood seeping out past his palms, his profanity varied and extensive. Murphy shoved her toward Tagget and charged forward, raising his musket to strike Stina with the butt. Danika stretched out a foot and tripped him. As he hit the ground, she saw Kyne put his boot to Stina’s hip, saw the marksman Hare prevent him from taking a second kick, saw muskets coming up…

“Enough!” Sergeant Black grabbed Kyne’s arm and threw him away from Hare, now standing over Stina. “You deserved that hit for letting her past your guard.”

“She took me by surprise!”

“And I’m sure that’s an excuse the Record Keeper is tired of hearing from the newly dead. Corporal Carlsan, take Kyne’s place. Kyne, you’re behind the redhead.”

“But…”

Danika couldn’t see the sergeant’s expression, but it shut Kyne up.

“Ma’am…”

The lieutenant’s frown deepened at the honorific, but Danika gave the sergeant the attention an Alpha deserved.

“…tell the women not to try anything like that again. We
will
knock you out and drag you if it comes to it.”

She met his gaze levelly for a moment, then nodded. “Nicely done, Stina,” she said in Aydori. “But the sergeant says that if anyone tries something similar, they’ll be knocked out and dragged. As I doubt it will slow them any more than if we’re stumbling along conscious, and as we can’t do enough damage to free ourselves, and as I’d rather none of us were irreparably damaged, passive resistance only for now.”

“You’ll tell us when we can be a little more active, Alpha?” Stina showed teeth. The Mage-pack inevitably picked up their spouses’ expressions.

Danika returned her smile. “I will.”

Head pounding, shoulders burning, Mirian collapsed to the ground the moment the two soldiers released her. The one named Chard looked a little surprised and bent to touch her cheek.

“You hurt?”

“Why are you shouting?” the other one, Armin, asked him.

Chard glanced up and shrugged. “She went down like a one-bit whore, I thought she was hurt.”

“But why,” Armin sighed, “were you shouting?”

“In case she doesn’t speak Imperial.”

“She speaks Imperial.”

Chard moved away as the officer, Captain Reiter, came to stand over her. Mirian didn’t look up. She wasn’t entirely certain she could; her head felt like it weighed a hundred pounds.

“How do you know, Cap? She hasn’t said nothing.”

“She’s been listening too intently for someone who doesn’t understand what’s being said.”

Mirian heard Chard and Armin move away and the captain move closer. She couldn’t stop herself from crying out as he cupped her jaw and lifted her head.

“I’m not hurting you, I…”

Blinking away tears, she gritted her teeth as he tilted her head to better see the bruising under her chin.

“Chard.”

“It wasn’t while we had her, Cap. Must’ve happened in the river.”

“If I find out…”

“It happened in the river.” Chard hadn’t exactly been kind, and he’d had his hand on her bottom as often as the terrain made the excuse plausible, but he hadn’t needed to wait for an excuse and he hadn’t been cruel and he hadn’t looked at her like Best had. Like she was something he’d found on his shoe in the gutter. When the captain frowned, she added, “The current pulled the oar from my hand and it hit me.”

“You speak Imperial very well.”

“My father is a banker.” She paused to wet dry lips. “He says money doesn’t stop at borders.”

He was studying her face, so she studied his. Late twenties, maybe early thirties—he had the look of a life lived hard. Pock marks on one cheek and the thin white line of an old scar through an eyebrow and across his temple—old enough he must’ve been a boy when he got it. His eyes were a sort of mix of blue and gray and his hair a sort of mix of blond and brown. Not mixed the way Pack hair was mixed but lighter where it had been longer in the sun. His face was narrow with high cheekbones and a pointed chin, his stubble darker and redder than his hair. There was a newer scar just visible above the collar of his uniform. His eyelashes were absurdly long and thick and his lower lip had a sort of dimple in the middle of it.

Objectively, he wasn’t unattractive.

Except that he was an enemy who’d taken her captive along with five members of the Mage-pack, killed at least one coachman and two Pack, and it was impossible for her to be objective regarding him. Given a chance, she’d push him off a cliff and laugh as he hit the ground. Well, maybe not laugh, but she’d definitely see it as justice served.

“You saw us take the others on the road,” he said at last. “So you know this has nothing to do with you personally.”

A part of her wanted to tell him that he’d made a mistake, that she wasn’t the mage he’d been searching for. A larger part of her realized that he’d have no reason to leave her alive if he knew his mistake. A very small part looked forward to the amount of trouble the captain was going to be in if he showed up with her instead of a sixth member of the Mage-pack. Her lip dragged as she bared her teeth. “And yet, I’m taking it personally. Funny that.”

Chard snickered.

“Chard, get wood for a fire. A small one. We don’t want to attract attention. Are you thirsty?”

It took Mirian a moment to realize the last question had been directed at her. Pride warred with thirst and, finally, she nodded.

“Armin. Tie her hands around this tree and leave her with a canteen. You’ll eat what we eat later,” he added.

She whimpered as Armin pulled her arms out in front of her body,
unable to move them herself. When the captain turned away, a muscle jumping in his jaw, she whimpered again. She wouldn’t be her mother’s daughter if she didn’t know how to use guilt as a weapon.

The water was warm and tasted of the inside of the canteen. It was awkward drinking it around the sapling, but it was still the best water she’d ever tasted.

By the time the soldiers had the fire going, it was full dark. Heavy cloud covered the moon, so even had the captain wanted to keep going, they couldn’t. From the way he kept glancing up at the sky, then back the way they’d come, Mirian suspected he wanted to. Smart man. The Pack Leader couldn’t cross the border, but Jaspyr Hagen could, and once he got her scent he’d be able to follow her to the ends of…

“Captain.” Best had his musket in his hand. “There’s something out there.”

All four of them froze and over the crackling of the fire and the beating of her own heart, Mirian could hear a crashing through the underbrush, a yelp of pain, more crashing, and a big black dog limped into the circle of light on three legs, the broken end of a rope trailing from around his neck. When it…no, when
he
saw the men, he dropped to his belly and crept forward, tail sweeping the ground.

The gunshot nearly stopped her heart, and she shrieked.

Branches broke. The dog yelped and ran.

Over by the fire, Chard held the end of Best’s musket and glared at him. “It’s a dog, you stupid prick! It had a rope around its neck. Probably some farm dog abandoned when the army rolled past. It broke free and it’s frightened and it came to the fire to find people and you tried to shoot it!”

Best yanked his weapon free. “It could’ve been one of the beastmen!”

“We’re in Pyrahn, and it had a rope around its neck!”

“I didn’t see the fucking rope!”

“I did!”

“You wouldn’t know the difference between a beastman and a dog if it licked your ass!”

Breath coming shallow and fast, Mirian fought with the confining weight of her skirts to put the sapling between herself and the soldiers. The captain turned toward her, noted her reaction to the gunshot,
nodded, and turned away. He wouldn’t ask, he’d assume she’d lie, but he thought he could read the truth in her reaction.

“Sit down. Both of you.”

“Captain…”

“It had a rope around its neck, Best.”

“Sir, the size…”

“This close to the Aydori border, I expect large dogs are the rule.”

“You think the beastmen bred with…”

The captain raised a hand. “I don’t want to think about it.”

“No, sir. Me, either,” Best agreed, smirking.

Food kept them quiet. Mirian was nodding off, stretched out by the tree, her head against her arm, when she heard Chard murmur, “Who’s a good dog, then? Are you hungry? Thirsty? Come on, I won’t hurt you.”

The dog was a shadow against the ground, creeping forward toward Chard’s outstretched hand. His eyes locked on the Imperial soldier, he stretched out his neck and took the dried meat from Chard’s fingers. The next thing Mirian knew, he was on his back, three feet in the air, dark lines against the firelight, with Chard rubbing his belly.