Page 5 of Prize of the Warlord
As we keep riding slowly down the mountain, I become aware that without the scant protection of my undergarments, the area between my legs has been rubbing against the saddle. Wincing, I squirm, tilting my hips up so I’m sitting more on my ass and less on my sensitive parts.
The man behind me lets out a strangled huff of surprise, and too late I realize that the motion ground me against him more firmly than I intended.
Something stiffens against my rear—a hard column of flesh.
6
I try to stay still, I really do. But the saddle is hurting my bare privates and I don’t want raw patches of bleeding flesh there—so very carefully I adjust my position again.
My captor’s body hardens still more, and he snarls, “Stop moving.”
“I can’t help it. The saddle is hurting me because—because there’s nothing between me and it.”
“You are the worst kind of prisoner,” he grumbles. “Weak, needy, always complaining.” Then louder, in a tone rough with frustration, he calls, “Halt!”
The company halts while Deep-Voice spreads another fur across the saddle, leather side down. Once we’re seated again, the ride is much more comfortable—perhaps a little too comfortable. The fur is so soft, and it tickles against my sensitized skin in a most illicit way.
It’s still cold, but there’s barely any wind, and no rain. The sun shines through a thin veil of cloud, looking as pale and wan as I feel. The fever I had before my parents left, the one that kept me home in bed—I think it’s returning. It’s the only explanation for the rush of heat through my body and the icy chills that follow.
I don’t dare speak of it, though.
Beyond the foot of the mountains lies a broad, ridged plain, white with red streaks here and there. The expanse of scarlet and snow stretches nearly as far as I can see, until the very edge of the horizon where I think I can make out the smudgy line of a forest.
“This is the Bloodsalt,” I murmur in awe. “The fields of salt and red clay, where nothing grows. No wonder you want our land. This place is terrible.”
“Your land?” my captor grunts. “Your father’s domain used to be my people’s land, generations ago.”
“No, it wasn’t.” I frown. “My people have lived in our district for three hundred years, ever since Ashring the Bold discovered our valley.”
My captor snorts. “Ashring the Bold? My people call him Ashring the Bloody.” He rattles off several more words in his language, then translates. “It means Bane of Solace, Banisher of Light. He expelled us from our home.”
“That can’t be true. No one lived in the valley when our people came here. It was our intended home, prophesied by the ancestors—”
Deep-Voice’s palm clamps over my mouth. I inhale sharply through my nose, getting a deep whiff of his scent—sweat and leather and dark spice, like the heated peppers Joss likes to sprinkle over her food.
“Close your mouth, little fool.” His hot breath gusts across the entrance of my ear. “Or I’ll put something in it to keep you quiet.”
My skin stipples with panic, because I’m not sure if he means a gag, or—something else.
By the time we pause for a respite, my temporary burst of talkative energy has dissipated, and I’m little more than a limp rag of chilled flesh, fever, and pain. My inner thighs and knees are chafed. My ribs and stomach still hurt from being bounced against the ruffian’s pauldron when he took me from my room. The area between my legs is sore and sensitive, and I have to relieve myself again. As if that wasn’t enough, my belly is hollow and aching with hunger.
But there’s nowhere to rest, or hide, or run. The entire plain is thick with red clay, caked with a layer of salt. My tutor told me this desolate area was the work of a mage who lost control of her powers; but I don’t mention it aloud. My captor probably has an alternate version of that story, too.
When Deep-Voice takes me down from the horse, I collapse into the crust of powdery salt. It feels like snow, crumbly yet granular. Dizzily I draw a line in it with my finger, down to the crimson clay beneath.
A huge shadow falls over me. “Get up,” says Deep-Voice.
I look up, and for the first time I get a clear view of the man who has taken me.
7
My captor is enormous—I knew that much already—but seeing the girth of his arms and the bulky wall of his torso in the sunlight turns me watery inside. His legs are like leather-clad tree trunks. Through the gap of his unfastened tunic, his chest bulges with mounds of muscle.
There is no escaping this gigantic warrior.
Above a thick, powerful neck, framed by long blond hair, is his face—rugged slanting cheekbones and a jaw sharp as a mountain cliff. I think his eyes are green. They’re glaring at me from beneath straight dark brows.
“I was wrong,” he clips. “You’re not a rat. You’re a mouse.”
