Page 57 of The Captive's Curse
I licked my lips and closed my eyes against a wave of dizziness as my cock sprang to attention.
My eyes popped open again as a shout came from my right, and I whipped my head around in horror to see two men-at-arms leap from the bushes, drawn crossbows in their hands.
Enzo’s shocked face, eyes black and mouth open, swam in my suddenly blurry vision. I leapt to my feet, Enzo jumped up and scaled the wall again with extraordinary grace, gods, he’d get away from them, but why were they even—
And a strong arm caught me around the middle, pinning my arms, as a heavy body pressed against my back. Something against my neck…a blade, pricking beneath my jaw.
Enzo stopped dead, poised at the top of the wall, eyes riveted to me.
“I’d prefer him alive, but you use your filthy magic on me and I’ll have them put their bolts through his heart,” said a voice pitched low for my ear only. I could almost feel his lips move, he’d leaned so close.
Hans. I shuddered, and my magic rose up, clamoring to do—something, anything, but I didn’t know how quickly a crossbow could fire.
Enzo had held me in almost this same position when he’d taken me unawares a week before. Hans’s vile parody of his touch had my stomach churning, bile rising into my throat.
The crossbows didn’t waver, and three more men came jogging up from the other side, taking up their own positions with swords drawn. Why hadn’t Enzo run? He must know Hans wouldn’t really cut my throat! It was an empty threat, and the risk of a bolt striking him as he jumped over seemed less than the risk if he stayed. But his eyes darted back and forth from thecrossbowmen to the swordsmen to me and Hans, and he’d gone white around the lips, his jaw set.
“You’re going to lay down any weapons you’re carrying and come along,” Hans called out to Enzo. “And then you’re going to take me to the castle you’ve been dirtying up, and tell your men to surrender.”
“You won’t murder your host’s noble brother,” Enzo said, his voice steady despite the tension in every line of him. “Don’t be absurd.”
And yet he still stayed where he was.
Hans laughed, a smug chuckle that set my teeth on edge and had me rigid with disgust, shaking with the need to wrench myself out of his arms, or turn him into a misshapen goat, and knowing his men would shoot Enzo if I did.
“But it wouldn’t be me who murdered him,” Hans said. “It’d be you, of course. These are my men, loyal to me alone. They’ll say whatever I tell them to. So tragic, the lovely Lord Cyril cut down in the flower of his youth by a common criminal. I arrived moments too late. Very unfortunate. Lord Montefime will finally be moved to assist me in hunting you down, as he ought to have from the beginning, and the other local lords will follow his lead. So I win either way, you see, and I don’t give a good gods-damn about Cyril, so don’t think I’ll hesitate.”
Silence fell for a long moment, as true fear crept icily through my guts and froze all my limbs in place. Enzo had a responsibility to his people. He’d go, take his chances with the bowmen’s aim, and leave me to Hans’s dubious mercy; he’d have to, and I wouldn’t even blame him. Hans might even be able to kill or capture Enzo anyway.
As the knife dug in, a tickling trickle of blood wending its way down my neck and wetting the collar of my shirt, I knew that I’d die here. Enzo didn’t care for me. He wouldn’t…
Our eyes met. The corner of his lip curled, a contemptuous snarl. His knuckles, clenched around the hilt of the long knife at his belt, were as white as if the bones had poked through.
Fresh horror lanced through me.
Did he think I’d…he couldn’t possibly think I’d betrayed him to Hans, could he?
My lips moved, but no sound came out, my tongue too numb and my throat too dry. I mouthed the shape of his name.
Enzo’s jaw worked, a muscle jumping.
“I’m coming down,” he said, and took the knife from his belt, tossing it to the ground. “I don’t have any other weapons.”
“The hell you don’t,” Hans called. “The others.”
With a grimace, Enzo pulled another knife from his coat, a third from his boot, and yet another from somewhere in the side of his trousers. All of them went into the same heap at the foot of the wall. He held his hands out at his sides and shrugged.
“Come on, then,” Hans said, and Enzo climbed down, the crossbowmen closing in so that when he turned, they were only two feet from him, their bolts trained on his chest. The swordsmen ranged themselves near him too. I almost laughed, except that I’d have sobbed instead. Five armed men to capture Enzo? Was Hans so very afraid of him? It was a compliment, in its way.
“Bind him and secure him,” Hans told his soldiers. “We’ll be riding out in a quarter of an hour.”
They nodded and chorused agreement, one of them putting up his sword and moving in to seize Enzo roughly by the arm. Enzo sneered, but he didn’t resist. When I caught a glimpse of his face through the men surrounding him, his expression had gone hard and closed-off, and he wasn’t looking at me.
Because he couldn’t bear to, or because he thought I’d betrayed him?
Whether he hated me or…didn’t hate me, he’d done this for me, allowed himself to be taken for me, to save me. It beat in my blood, in my racing heart, in the shaking in my hands.For me. My belly heaved, and I let out a low moan. I’d be sick thinking about it—hopefully all over Hans. It was the least he deserved.
“I may be able to spare him after this is over,” Hans murmured, still so close to my ear that I could feel the heat of his breath. Vomiting became more likely with every word. “I’ll certainly consider it if you behave yourself. Annoy me, and I’ll cut off his right hand just for fun. He doesn’t need that to show me where he’s been hiding all this time.”
