Page 98 of Swordheart
They vanished around the bend. Zale relaxed. Halla rubbed her forehead.
“That could have gone better,” she said.
“I doubt he suspects we’ve got bodies,” said Zale. “He probably just thinks we’re in a cult.”
“Is that better or worse than bodies?”
“It’s fine as long as he doesn’t want to join our cult.”
Brindle stared straight ahead, shaking his head slowly. He muttered something under his breath, fortunately not in a language that either human understood.
Halla looked both ways for observers, then carefully drew the sword, and Sarkis appeared beside her.
“The horses were running when I dematerialized,” said Sarkis. “They’ll… ah, you two look a trifle tense. Is something wrong?”
“There are rather more dead bodies than I find acceptable stowed under my seat!” said Zale.
“How many dead bodieswouldyou find acceptable?”
“Ideally, zero.” The priest chewed on their lower lip. “One would be bad, but I feel like I would handle it better. Two is really an excessive number.”
Halla made a strangled noise that might have been a laugh or a sob or a sigh. Even she wasn’t entirely sure. Sarkis pounded her on the back for a moment, apparently fearing that she was choking.
“Well, at least the horses will keep going for a little bit, I expect.” He scowled. “I don’t like to spook a horse, but the farther away they get before they stop, the safer it’ll be for everyone.”
“Better not try it with an ox, sword-man.”
“I would not dream of it, Brindle.”
“That’s the horses sorted then,” said Zale. They sighed. “And now to sort out the bodies…”
Finding a pond was easier said than done.
It had to be far enough off the road that nobody would notice them lugging bodies and close enough to the road that theycouldlug bodies. It had to be a pond that nobody was using to water their stock, because neither Halla nor Zale wanted to risk fouling someone’s primary water source. And they definitely had to have some kind of tree cover so that no one would be strolling by and notice a pair of corpses frozen under the ice.
And of course, nobody would have put such ponds on the map, preferably with convenient notes like, “Perfect for body disposal!” or, “Dump unwanted enemies here!”
The bodies stayed in the wagon that night, which meant that everybody else stayed outside. Brindle generously offered the ox’s body heat, so there were three humans and one gnole huddled against the side of the large, bemused, but basically good-natured ox.
Sarkis resigned himself to not getting much sleep. Zale curled themself into a neat ball, not unlike Brindle. Halla dropped off immediately and then began trying to wedge herself into the space between his back and the ox.
Well, it’s the warmest spot around, I suppose…
He wondered how on earth she’d shared a bed with her husband. Had the man simply brought his own blanket to wrap himself in?
The thought of Halla sharing that other man’s bed woke an unexpected jealousy. He surrendered to it, and gathered her up so that she was across his lap with her back to the ox’s warmth.
This was not the best idea, he realized a moment later. It was all too easy to imagine her waking up, turning to straddle his hips, looking in his eyes and saying… saying…
Probably,“Oh no, are your legs asleep again? I’m sorry!”
He stifled a sigh. Brindle reached out and poked his shoulder with one clawed finger.
“Hmm?” He looked up into the gnole’s striped face.
“Twisting your whiskers, sword-man. A human should go to sleep.”
“A human’s trying.”
