Page 138 of A Vow of Blood and Tears

My feet remained planted firmly where I was. The wargs were gone, but it was pure madness to walk into that forest alone. Bane would be furious. I would feel stupid later when I took my well-deserved chastisement.

I glanced over my shoulder at the town, trying to keep my eyes above ground-level, but none of the legions were in sight, nor Bane and Visca. I waved one arm, hoping that someone would see, but no one came.

The groan came again, lower, desperate. A soft whisper. “Is someone there? Help. Help me.”

It was the desperation in his voice that called me forth, the weakening of it. I knew perfectly well I should’ve turned around and searched for someone, but my body moved with a mind of its own despite the screaming in the back of my mind.

The wargs were gone. None would dare to remain with a fiend around. But whoever was calling for help, they might not have time for me to find a knight, not if they were spilling their life’s blood in the snow as they begged.

Even as I walked further into the trees, I told myself that I wouldn’t go out of sight of the village. It was a compromise. I had todosomething—maybe I couldn’t scream for aid, but I could find who was calling.

And he was there, sitting down like Antonetta, like the woman by the church, with his legs sprawled out before him and his back against a tree.

He still wore clothes, unlike most of the bodies. Woolens slashed through, so much blood it was impossible to say what color they had been before. A hunting knife lay on his lap, clutched in one loose hand.

His face… the man’s eyes were gone. Claws had raked across his face, taking his sight with one blow. My stomach turned again, but there was nothing left to come up.

But he was alive, and that was all that mattered. The wargs had missed one.

The man lifted his head as I approached, the sound of my feet crunching in the snow the only sound I made on my arrival. “Is someone there?”

Those sockets, black with dried blood, faced me, but even as I signed,I’m here, I knew it was useless. He couldn’t see. I couldn’t speak.

He sucked in a breath, and I took another cautious step. “If someone’s there, say it now,” he growled. The blood that had dried on his cheeks cracked, flaking away.

Let me help you, I said desperately. The only survivor—hehadto make it. I stepped to his feet and crouched down, touching his leg with one hand.

He moved faster than I expected, heaving himself forward and slashing with the knife. I had one hand still raised, meaning to touch his hand next—but the blade cut through my palm, blood spilling down my wrist. The pain was dull at first, becoming a white-hot shock within seconds.

“Say something, damn you,” he half-shrieked as I fell back.

I pressed my hand into the snow, hoping to staunch the flow, and stared at his mutilated face, sick and desperate. He was bleeding, he would die soon, I needed someone, anyone, to get here…

I stood up shakily, knowing I could do nothing. I hadn’t been thinking clearly. If I tried to grab his hand, to show him human touch, he’d stab me before he understood I was a person, too. I needed Bane now.

My retreating steps were so loud against the silence and the man’s harsh, raspy breathing. He clutched the knife with white-knuckled hands, head twisted in my general direction.

“I hear you there,” he snarled, heaving himself up against the tree with one hand, brandishing the knife in the other. “I hear you moving about. I killed one of you already, and I’ll take another. You won’t have me, you hear? You won’t have me, you bastard dog!”

No, no, no. I didn’t move, not daring to make so much as a rustle. I couldn’t stay, and I couldn’t go.

His breath was bubbling, head wobbling to keep it straight. The same four words poured out of him in raspy, panting snarls. “You won’t have me. You won’t have me.”

Please, Lady, ancestors, anyone, send Bane.

But there was only me, frozen and terrified, and the man, choking on his own breath, ranting all the while.

He coughed blood, heaving for breath, and put the knife to his throat. I stepped forward in shock, meaning to stop him—buthe dragged the blade across his own neck with a savagery I could barely fathom.

“Won’t have me,” he choked, blood steaming in the cold air as it sluiced over the blade, soaking into his shirt. He’d cut an artery, his heart pumping his lifeblood into the air with every beat.

I lunged at him, tearing the knife from his shivering, weakening hand, tossing it aside as I pressed my cloak to the gash in his throat. It soaked through instantly, the man’s ruined sockets glaring at me as I tried to save his life, applying pressure so hard my arms ached.

I was too late. I was the wrong one. I could do nothing to help.

Time passed meaninglessly. At some point I became aware that my hands were sticky and cold. The man had stopped breathing a long time ago.

No one had survived. If anyone else had found him, he would still be alive. What a sick joke. It was nauseating.

---