Page 11 of Captive

Zaiur and Aruna bickered quietly again as they set up camp. It seemed to be their default method of communication. She wondered, as she watched them, what they’d been doing out by the road and why they’d ended up traveling together. They certainly didn’t seem to like each other much.

Novikke sat against a wall near the window, where a hint of light came in through a crack. Cold wind also came in, which she tried to ignore.

She was careful not to move her injured arm. Aruna had pushed it back into its socket, which had been excruciating for a second and only dully painful afterward, but now it still ached, like she’d torn something.

She stretched out on her uninjured side, with her back along the wall. The change in sleeping schedule was getting to her. She was exhausted all the time.

She wondered if anyone missed her. There was Lexas at the bar in Livaki, who she was friendly with. And there was Dion in Valtos, and the group at Fort Varian. They would probably wonder where she’d gone, after a while. And a while after that, they’d forget about her.

Her brow twitched down in a flash of anger that she had no right to feel. There was no one left who cared about her. That wasn’t anyone else’s fault, though. She couldn’t be angry at anyone for not being there to worry for her.

And she couldn’t blame the army for not coming to her rescue. Plenty of more important people than herself had been captured or killed in battle. That was the way things went, wasn’t it?

The only person who could help her now was herself. And that was no different from how things had always been.

At some point, she drifted off.

She awoke some time later, in darkness and silence except for the wind whistling through the shutters. The cold had awakened her. There was no sun on this side of the hill, she realized. Nothing to warm the stone, even during the day. Her fingers and toes were icy. A shudder ran through her, and she curled herself into a tight ball. It didn’t help much.

There was a rustling nearby. She went still, listening. More rustling, and then soft footsteps coming toward her.

She didn’t open her eyes. She wouldn’t have been able to see, anyway. She pretended to be asleep, which she was not sure would do her any good.

The footsteps stopped beside her head. There was a long pause. She realized she was holding her breath. She kept holding it.

Then something settled on top of her. She flinched, and then she realized what it was. A blanket.

The footsteps padded away.

After a moment, she reached up to pull it closer around her.

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