Page 2 of Tortured

Is changing me.

My killer rounds a nearby boulder, but before he sees me, I crouch behind it. I have the sense that he doesn’t know where I am or he wouldn’t have swaggered so brazenly around the rock. Closing my eyes, I inhale silently through my nose. The smell of wood smoke and cooked rabbit fills my sinuses. The assassin left his warm fire to finish me off in the dimming twilight.

A heartbeat thrums in my ears. I try to ignore the oppressive gallop that finds me every time my attackers do. After I killed the third one, I realized it wasn’t my racing heartbeat. It was theirs.

I can hear their distinct rhythm from meters away.

As if showing foresight, time unveils the exact moment I should strike. I see what I should do before it happens. This is a new gift that emerged just two days prior.

Premonition.

Niawen never spoke of this ability.

Back to the present. My assailant lifts his sword, his movements flickering into my sight as if he’s already completed a careful turn around the boulder, even though it has not yet happened. When his foot actually lands with a muted thud, I plunge my silver blade between the ribs and into the man’s heart. He slumps to the ground, groaning.

I slouch against the cold stone while the raking breaths of the man, and his thready pulse, needle me. Minutes later, his heartbeat stops, finally leaving me in peace.

I force myself to get up, to move on. Another assassin won’t be far behind.

Chapter 2

After a week of dodging Caedryn’s men and traversing the unwelcome land of Rolant, I cross the mountains in the south. The old peak is rounded, with wrinkly folds where crisp streams spurt from the ground. Snow carpets the landscape, but my passage is easy.

My senses stay on high alert, even as I lie down for the night over bundled pine limbs used as a barrier from the snow.

My thoughts drift to Niawen. Before I tore myself from her outside Caedryn’s citadel, we shared one lone kiss. I had pulled her desperately to me. “Stars, Niawen, I love you. I will love you forever. Oh, damn it all!” My mouth fell on hers in an urgent kiss that was meant to fix everything that had ever been wrong between us.

But her shivering body in my arms bore testimony to our harsh reality.

Her light is gone.

She is cold because of her lack, whereas I will never be cold again.

The late winter weather is fierce, and though ice crystals form from my breath, I don’t feel the cold.

How can I when her light is inside me, keeping me warm? If I lie still long enough, the snow melts around me.

Her light is also a beacon for Lord Caedryn. The reason his assassins find me with ease.

I’ll do anything to give her light back. Anything.

Creator above, show me a way.

Blood whooshes in my ears and throbs in my neck. The night is eerily quiet, and my body won’t relax.

Just as well, I detect a group of men, the same ones who’ve been trailing me for two days, stalking closer. I hear every step as the hunters creep, every grate of their swords sliding from their sheaths, and every deep, steady coarseness of their breaths as they study me, their prey, pretending to lie here helpless.

Over and over again this is how my nights play out. I wonder when Caedryn will run out of men. Can’t he tell Niawen isn’t with me? Or maybe not. I never leave any survivors to run home to their lord and give report.

Most likely, all bets are on revenge. Caedryn will have wanted to make me suffer because I stole what was most precious to him—his wife and unborn child.

Just as the first assassin approaches, I twist away from my pallet and slash my blade across his neck. I whirl around before he drops to the ground, and drive the metal tip into another’s stomach. After a swift draw, I turn and meet an assassin approaching on my left. He lifts his sword and strikes, but I parry his attack. I hear a twang and roll to my right, bringing my sword across the ankle of an attacker.

Nice try, Caedryn.

I feel nearly invincible.

I calm my senses from overload, slowing my breath, reveling in yet another victory.

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