Eyes closed, face drawn into tortured lines, Maddek bowed his head. As did the others. Which was not just grief and rage, she realized. It was gratitude. Respect, because she had taken the vengeance they had not.
But an arrow through Lazen’s throat and a dagger in Cezan’s back had not been enough. It would never be enough.
Kelir’s gaze was like fire. “Would that we had known before we let his carcass go.”
Yvenne might have told them. But Maddek did not seem prepared to rescind his vow to tear out her tongue for speaking more.
“Where is Vela’s curse upon them?” Ardyl’s anger was directed toward Yvenne but seemed meant for the goddess instead. “If she sees as you do, then she would have known. By Vela’s law, a rapist is cursed and should be punished. We have encountered those who have been marked and broken by her power. Yet Zhalen is not?”
Her rage echoed Yvenne’s at a younger age. Now she gave the same answer Yvenne’s mother had.
“Vela can only touch those who have invited her in.” Such as those who quested for her, or the Nyrae warriors, or the priestesses who tended her temples.
Though even if an invitation was given, the goddess did not always accept. Yvenne’s mother had prayed for Vela’s strength, as had Yvenne.
But now she was glad the goddess had not answered and avenged Maddek’s parents or her own mother. For instead Yvenne would do it herself.
Perhaps that was Vela’s answer.
Ardyl’s gaze finally fell away from hers, her voice bitter. “Then why does she not touch the nearest priestess and break Zhalen?”
“Because she does not need to,” Yvenne said softly. “My father’s curse is here. I am his curse.” She looked to Maddek. “You are his curse. Are you not?”
“I am,” he said gruffly, voice thick with emotion. New rage, new grief, new purpose.
Holding his gaze, she said, “I prefer to believe that Vela’s gift is to allow us the satisfaction of breaking him. Will you not visit pain upon my father, agony as he has never known?”
His eyes gleamed. “I will.”
Hanan’s ruddy staff, how the bloodlust in his gaze spoke to hers. This was not only about vengeance, however, but also law and justice. Heart thundering, she looked to Ardyl again. “So you see. We are her curse. As are all rulers and citizens who do not allow such offenses to remain unpunished.”
“And unpunished they will remain if we wait here much longer. We must ride,” Maddek said to her, and reached for the lizard leg in her hand. “Discard the rest of that. You can hardly choke it down.”
“Do not take it from me.” Fiercely, she yanked it away from his reach. “I cannot remember the last time my belly was full. I will fill it, even if with this. I will finish it as we ride.”
If she was to ride. Her horse was dead. Perhaps Maddek meant to leash her behind his mount and force her to run.
It mattered not. She would finish her meal while being pulled along the ground.
His dark eyes searched hers before he nodded. His gaze swept the others. “Ready, then.”
The warriors broke from the circle, heading swiftly for their mounts. Yvenne could not move so quickly. She hobbled after Maddek, but when impatience darkened his expression and he bent as if to lift and carry her, she stopped him.
“You said I was to walk to ease the stiffness,” she reminded him. “This is my only opportunity, unless you intend to drag me behind your horse.”
“Do not tempt me,” he said, but no heat was in it. Swiftly he saddled his mount, fastening his rolled furs and satchel to the back.
Without ceremony, he gripped her waist and lifted her astride, then leapt up behind her.
And Yvenne was sorry her horse had been eaten, but this was much better than desperately clinging to its mane and praying she wouldn’t be jolted from her seat as they raced through the forest. Never had she felt more secure than with Maddek’s hard chest at her back and his arms at her sides. When his horse abruptly moved forward, she had no fear of falling.
With Maddek behind her, she had no fear at all.
They only went a few steps, to where Danoh stood beside her mount, sorting through a leather pouch tied to her saddle. Already astride, Ardyl joined them, a pile of rags in her lap and a vial in her hand.
At a glance from her, Danoh shook her head.
Uncertainty crossed Ardyl’s decorated face when she looked to Maddek. “We have the half-moon milk but not the sleeping draught that accompanies it.” Her gaze shifted to Yvenne’s. “We have neither of us needed to drink it of late.”
Because they had neither been intimate with a man of late, Yvenne understood. So there could be no pregnancy to prevent.
“Is it not effective without the sleeping draught?” Maddek’s voice sounded behind her. Now that they were mounted, the top of her head came to his chin—their heights more even than when they were standing, but he still towered over her.
The two warriors exchanged an uneasy glance. “It is effective,” Ardyl said. “But unpleasant.”
“Then the sleeping draught matters not.”
Ardyl’s gaze turned withering. “You say that only because you have never taken the half-moon milk.”
Neither had Yvenne, but she had little choice. “I will take it now so there can be no doubt that any child I conceive is Maddek’s. You and the other warriors will be my witnesses.”
With a heavy sigh, Ardyl nodded and poured a small measure of white liquid from the vial into the cap. “If Vela truly looks through your eyes, my lady, I pray that she will be merciful upon you now. And upon me for giving it to you,” she added wryly.
Though the potion looked like milk, it tasted nothing of the sort, but rather chalky and bitter. Yvenne swallowed it down—and used the lingering bitterness in her mouth to mask the foul flavor of her next bite of lizard.
Danoh mounted her horse, then looked to Maddek. “Carry her as a babe this day.”
His big hands circled Yvenne’s waist again. Abruptly she found herself sitting sideways upon the saddle, with her legs dangling over his heavy thigh, her side against his bare chest, and his steely arm secured behind her.
Ardyl held out the rags. Yvenne hesitated, the lizard leg clutched in her left hand. She could not grip that bundle with only the weak fingers of her right hand.
Maddek took them instead, and her face flamed when he wasted not a moment parting her silk robes. His hand delved beneath her breechcloth. His callused fingers scraped the soft inner skin of her thighs, and she braced herself for some new humiliation as he had tried to visit upon her the previous day.
But he only tucked the rags securely against her and withdrew his hand, then gripped his reins.