And by Hanan’s weeping staff, she slept so hot, a warrior needed no fire to help warm his bed. Maddek would have thrown off his furs if it wouldn’t have left her uncovered.
After her moon night, Maddek could throw them off without hesitation. For it would be he who covered her then.
A white flash of lightning split the gray clouds ahead. Maddek’s gaze shot over his shoulder again. Yvenne’s horse was placid and dull, but even the most docile of mounts sometimes bolted during a storm. With tension gripping his body, Maddek waited for the crack and rumble of thunder.
When it came, her mount tossed its head, snorting. Releasing her pommel, Yvenne leaned forward and stroked the thick neck. Her lips moved—soothing the gelding with a murmur, though her face was pinched with unease, as if she feared the horse would panic and throw her. Her pale gaze darted to Banek, who looked on and nodded his approval.
When the next crack of thunder sounded, the horse’s ears flicked, but that was its only reaction. It continued plodding steadily along the muddied road.
Maddek looked to Kelir. A frown pleated the other warrior’s brow as he studied the woman and horse—a frown that deepened when lightning flashed again. Grimly, Kelir eyed the thundering sky. “Do we take shelter and wait for it to pass?”
They should. But this storm would not slow anyone who pursued them.
Maddek shook his head. “We press on,” he said.
CHAPTER 11
MADDEK
The storm’s fury abated midafternoon. Abruptly the rain stopped, clouds parting to reveal Enam’s glaring yellow eye. Beneath the sun’s burning stare, steam rose from the sodden earth, forming a heavy mist that crawled over the ground and swirled around the horses’ legs. The cracking thunder and howling wind subsided, replaced by the increasing roar of the Ageras as the road bore north and began to run parallel at a distance from the swollen riverbanks. Across its hazardous waters lay Ephorn—and farther north, Syssia.
Maddek’s gaze scanned the opposite bank. No travelers were in sight on the road that followed the river on Ephorn’s side.
Even if a company of Syssian soldiers gathered there, they would pose no immediate threat to Yvenne. Any soldiers in pursuit might come along the road behind them, but not from across the Ageras. To everything but the creatures that dwelled within the river, the swift waters were unnavigable and uncrossable. Only three great stone bridges spanned its width, and they’d been built by the gods themselves—one bridge far to the east, in Toleh. Another almost two days’ ride behind them. And the third in the port of Drahm, where the mouth of the river spilled into the Boiling Sea.
A fourth bridge had once linked the roads on either side of the river, but only one of their party had ever seen it.
Hoofbeats quickened behind him as Banek urged his mount forward. The gray-haired warrior pulled up even with Maddek, who turned in his saddle to look at Yvenne. Her sandaled heels against its sides, she was gently nudging her gelding forward as well, but her plodding mount did not respond.
Her horse’s reluctance drew grins from the warriors behind her. Each one of them had sat upon mounts as stubborn. Some more so—at least the gelding was walking.
Toric called out his advice. “Dig your heels in, my lady!” When she hesitated and glanced back at the young warrior, his grin broadened. “Your little feet won’t hurt his ribs. It’ll be nothing more than a tickle to wake him up and move him along.”
Nodding, she pressed her heels tighter. The horse didn’t respond, and when pain whitened her cheeks Maddek signaled to the four warriors. Immediately they urged their own mounts forward to flank Yvenne, ready to catch her if the horse bolted. A short word from Fassad sent one of his gray dogs darting in to nip at the gelding’s hocks.
Her horse broke into a bouncing trot. Maddek watched as she used the momentum of the gelding’s stride to rise in the saddle as he’d shown her—though at obvious cost. Her narrow face stiffened, her full mouth pressing into a thin, bloodless line.
“Still saddle sore,” Banek said quietly.
And still limping every time they dismounted, still hobbling each morning after she woke. But there was no cure for the pain except more riding, until her muscles became accustomed to the exertion.
“The old crossroads lie ahead,” Banek continued as Yvenne’s horse drew up between Maddek’s and Kelir’s. The scarred warrior leaned over in his saddle, ready to catch her mount’s bridle before it ran past, but she deftly slowed the gelding to a walk again with a light touch on her reins. “I should like to see what remains.”
Banek’s glance conveyed what he did not speak aloud: that Yvenne needed a respite from the road. But she was not alone. After a half day spent trudging through mud, the horses needed to rest and graze.
Maddek nodded. “How far?”
“Only a sprint.”
The distance a good horse could race without slowing. The gray-haired warrior pointed ahead at a grassy mound that, through the mist, Maddek had taken for a stony hill. But instead of a natural rise, it was rubble—ruins that had lain abandoned for a generation.
“That is one of the great bridges?” Yvenne stared ahead wide-eyed.
“And the trading town that stood at the crossroads,” Banek said in a voice heavier than Maddek had ever heard from him. “Once this road passed straight through.”
But after the Destroyer dropped the bridge on the town, travelers had been forced to go around the rubble. Now the route beyond the ruins couldn’t be seen past the curve in the road.
An ideal place for bandits to stage an attack, then.
Maddek studied the mound, searching for movement, then looked to Yvenne as she leaned forward in her saddle to peer past him, her pale gaze studying the older man’s face. “Did you ever visit this place before the Destroyer came?”
“I did.” A faint smile pulled at Banek’s mouth. “On a raid.”
“So far south?” Ardyl asked from behind them. After escorting Yvenne to Maddek’s side, the four warriors had not yet fallen back—nor would they now. Not when there was a tale of the raid to be told.
“What did you take?” That from Kelir.
“We heard a load of Tolehi iron was traveling along this road to Syssia, and we ambushed them just beyond the bridge.” The older man chuckled. “We had no more trouble stealing the load from its escort than we did stealing Maddek’s bride. But still we returned home empty-handed.”
That bride leaned forward again, as eager to hear the tale as Maddek’s warriors were. “What happened?”
Banek’s face reddened. “We were not satisfied with taking only what we could carry. So we took the entire load, which was too heavy even for oxen. Instead the train of wagons was drawn by a kergen.”