Fumbling around for a cup, she filled it and handed it to him. “Water is the most important.”
“It’s also heavy.” She heard him drinking, then there was a splash, and he muttered, “God, that feels good. What I wouldn’t give for a swim.”
“Get out!” she shrieked, forcing her eyelids open, her horror at what he was doing worse than the pain. “It’s forbidden!” Ignoring how he was staring at her as he climbed out, Lara held up a hand, lifting her fingers one by one as she said, “No animals are allowed to drink directly, lest they foul the waters. Only clean vessels are to be used, preferably of silver or gold. And no damned baths!”
“It’s full of sand and there isn’t anyone here but us.”
She glared at him, the effect ruined by the flood of tears running down her face. “How about I don’t want to drink the water that has soaked your sweaty feet.”
He shrugged as though that were the only valid part of the argument. “We should cut back to the coast. It’s closer.”
“The coast will be heavily patrolled. My father’s soldiers will be watching the desert in case we emerge.”
Her eyes demanded to be closed, but Lara ignored the pain as Aren pulled off his shirt and tossed it to one side. Then he lifted a hand to shadow his face as he scanned the surrounding desert. He had a new scar running along his ribs and another just above the elbow, and she found herself examining him for more changes to the body she knew so well. He was leaner than he’d been, captivity having eroded some of his muscle mass, though it did nothing to detract from his appearance. Aren turned back, and she closed her eyes again before he caught her staring.
“There’s no way those soldiers survived that storm,” he said. “And when they don’t return, your father will assume we’re as dead as they are.”
“Or that we killed them.”
He huffed out a breath. “Maybe.”
“And just because that group is dead doesn’t mean more won’t come,” Lara said. “Serin will suspect that I’d try to make it here. He’ll leave nothing to chance.”
“We could ambush whoever he sends. Take their mounts and supplies.”
Leaning on her shovel, Lara considered the idea. “He won’t send a small group. And they’ll come under the cover of darkness.”
“We could hide and then ambush them from behind come daylight.”
“That might work if we had any arrows, but my sisters took them all when they fled, and I don’t relish the thought of going hand-to-hand with upward of two dozen trained soldiers.”
Aren was silent for a moment. “What do you propose, then? That we sit here and slowly starve to death?”
A bead of sweat rolled into the scratches around her eye and Lara winced, curbing the urge to rub away the pain. “There is a caravan route east of here. I propose we ambush a merchant party and take what we need to reach Valcotta. They’ll have guards, of course, but nothing the two of us shouldn’t be able to handle.”
Silence.
Lara returned to shoveling sand, refusing to open her eyes and look at him because she could already feel his judgment. Already knew the words that would come from his lips even as he inhaled the breath needed to form them. “You want us to kill innocent merchants to take their supplies? That seems somewhat ruthless.”
She was a survivor, and to be one often necessitated ruthlessness. “Would you rather we die?”
“I’d rather we consider less extreme options. Why can’t we ask the merchants for help? Or just steal what we need and leave them alive. Or better yet, use some of that gold I know you have to buy what we need.”
It was strange to think she’d once believed him to be a cruel and merciless man, utterly devoid of compassion. That she’d spent nearly all of her life certain every Ithicanian was the same.
Pushing the shovel blade into a pile of sand, she turned to face him. “The merchants we’ll encounter are those heading north on the heels of that storm, which means if we leave them alive, it will only be a matter of days until they reach the outskirts of the Red Desert. Where they will no doubt encounter my father’s soldiers, who will question them extensively. Right now, we have the advantage that my father isn’t certain whether we are alive, which we lose as soon as those merchants describe being accosted by a pair meeting our description.”
“I’m aware of that.” Aren’s tone was cool. “But we’ll have too much of a head start for them to catch us in the desert.”
“But not enough of a head start that fast riders able to switch mounts every day won’t be able to beat us to Valcotta and intercept us on the opposite side.”
“You have an answer for everything, don’t you?” There was a dull clang as he kicked her shovel, then a splash as it toppled into the spring. “And how shocking that your answer is killing.”
Lara could feel her temper rising, the blood in her veins boiling as she fought to keep her composure. But it was a lost cause. “Do you think I want to kill people? That I enjoy it?” Opening her eyes, she stepped over the pile of sand and closed the distance between them, her hands balled into fists. “I’m not trying to save myself. I’m trying to save you because you are the only person capable of securing an alliance with Valcotta.”
“Why does it need to be me?”
“Because!” she shouted. “Other than Ahnna, you are the only Ithicanian whose identity the Empress even knows! Do you think she’s going to commit her navy to a costly battle because Jor asks her to? Because Lia asks her to? It has to be you because you’re the only person she will believe can deliver on the promises you make.”
He looked away.
“I know hard choices, Aren.” Her voice shook. “I know what it feels like to sacrifice the lives of innocents in order to save the lives of those I care about.” She gestured to the island, full of the bones of servants and musicians she’d done nothing to protect. “And it haunts me, but that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t do it again, because the alternative was the lives of my sisters. Just because a choice is hard doesn’t mean you don’t make it.” She paused, then asked, “So what will it be: a handful of merchants or every goddamned soul in Eranahl? Choose!”
The only sounds were the trickle of the spring and the roar of blood in her ears.
“No.” He shook his head. “I’m not killing innocent people to save my own skin. I refuse.”
Frustration clawed at her like a wild thing, fueled by desperation, because while she could protect him from storms and soldiers and starvation, she could not protect Aren from himself. Lara opened her mouth to argue, but the sound of hooves striking stone filled her ears, and her heart lurched. “Hide!”
Grabbing his arm, she dragged him into the compound, ducking behind one of the dormitories. She pushed him against the wall, far too aware of the hard muscles of his bare chest against her palm, the familiar scent of him in her nose.
Focus, you fool!
The hilt of her sword clutched in one hand, Lara peered around the corner, listening.
“How many?” Aren whispered, his breath warm against her ear, his hand gripping her forearm.