Her Master's Hand Page 5

  Ashcroft dropped her. She fell onto the ground with a ‘thump.’

  “Ow!” she chirped with annoyance, climbing back up on her elbows. “Stop doing that!”

  He picked her up again. “What do you mean he’s your father?” It couldn’t be true. She was a witch!

  “Well, not by blood, but he’s adopted me! He raised me. I carry his surname.” She was shucking off this information as if it wasn’t extraordinary. “But you don’t understand!” she cried, and he leaned forward, not wanting to miss the next bit. “He’s married me off to an evil wizard who has an evil plan he wants to use me in! He’ll beat me horribly! He’ll try to kill me! Please, he means to make a hell out of my life! He’s not who he looks like!”

  Possibly the girl was completely insane. None of what she said was making sense. “The great Hoel doesn’t do business with wizards, from what I’ve heard,” he replied skeptically.

  “He doesn’t! My husband’s put on a false face! His eyes change! Hoel doesn’t see it! He’s selling me into slavery and doesn’t see it!”

  Hoel not seeing something seemed out of place. Hoel was revered for his wisdom, so a wizard slipping under his radar seemed fantastical and ridiculous. It was much more likely that the girl was just a devious sort who was either fabricating stories to get what she wanted, or that she was a nervous young girl who was letting her imagination get away from her.

  “Are you sure you’re not Hoel’s servant girl or something?” he asked. That was still unlikely, but not quite as ridiculous as her being a surrogate child.

  She rolled her eyes and stomped her foot on the ground. “Why would I make something like that up? Still, I can’t go back there, wizard! I have to run as far away as possible. Damen would punish me for running away, and I don’t know if I’d survive it!” Her eyes were round and wet.

  Ashcroft frowned. “Damen who?”

  “Damen Vanguard! He’s—”

  “That Norolian warlord?” he asked, squinting one of his eyes at her. He couldn’t believe it… Unless she was, indeed, Hoel’s foster child. Hoel’s connections would be quite high indeed. Damen Vanguard was known to be a terrible force; he had taken most of the eastern kingdoms, and in some of those city states he had even been revered as a god. Not that he was—Damen Vanguard was merely a berserker. He was an incredible warrior, but his powers were limited, and he was by no means a wizard. A wizard would never dirty their hands like that for decades. They’d have wielded their powers and revealed themselves by now.

  “Yes!” she assured. “He’s at Hoel’s palace as we speak. Please, don’t bring me back there, not now. Hoel won’t believe me!”

  “Why wouldn’t he believe you?” Ashcroft asked, unable to believe that he was egging on his silly fantasy.

  “Because he’s Hoel! He can’t be the one who’s wrong, so he’ll think I’m making things up,” she griped.

  He raised an eyebrow. She looked like the mischievous, energetic sort.

  She eyed her shoes for a second, but then eventually shrugged. “Alright, so I’ve made things up in the past, but nothing about something this important!”

  Unwillingly, Ashcroft acquired a grin. If he could believe anything she said, she could believe that she was a problem child. The witch just didn’t want to marry yet, and didn’t agree with who her foster parents had chosen for her. That tale was as old as time. The solution was as old as time, too, which was that she got brought back home and made to accept her duties. Eventually she would realize being married to an extremely rich man who had conquered God-knew-how-many kingdoms was not the greatest tragedy of her life.

  “Please don’t,” she continued, her bottom lip trembling. Damn it, he couldn’t stand that! “Please don’t take me back to him…”

  Ashcroft was unsure of what to do. His father would have never approved of a plan where Ashcroft continued to stay involved with anything of Hoel’s. In fact, the girl might be seen as a hot potato, and anyone she was caught with would be filleted.

  On the other hand, however, no wizard had ever had such an opportunity as this! If he was to return a beloved to Hoel personally, Hoel might reward him with hospitality. If he could just make Hoel an ally, Ashcroft would get to learn things that no other wizard had learned. He’d have an ally no other wizard had ever had.

  Besides, he really had quite a death wish already. Life hadn’t seemed quite so precious lately. Why not take the risk?

  Ashcroft looked at the trembling, pleading girl, and sighed, “Come along.”

  The sobbing started nearly instantaneously. Damn it all, women and their heartbreak! Marriage was never that bad!

  They walked through the woods, on the way back to where Ashcroft tied up his horse. “Stop that blubbering!” he finally demanded. He was beginning to feel bad, and he was really nervous enough. “It’s only marriage. Your mind is playing tricks on you. A wizard would never pass by Hoel unnoticed. Besides, I can imagine worse than being the queen of a dozen or so kingdoms.” He rolled his eyes at that, but somehow his stomach churned.

  He did hope he wasn’t coming down with anything. He had felt strange the last couple of hours, and that was not improving his mood whatsoever.

  “Just kill me,” she begged pathetically.

  He lifted the girl onto his horse and then, after arranging the net back into his baggage, sat just behind her. “I’m not going to kill you. Nobody is. If you like, I’ll meet this husband of yours and see if I notice anything fishy.”

  “You’re stupid. You’re just going to die, too, you know. Magi aren’t welcome at my home.”

  “Except yourself?” he prompted. At her stubborn silence, he kicked at the horse and started down the road. After five minutes, he groaned, “Although you might not believe it, you are not the first girl ever born that was forced into an undesirable marriage. More often than not, however, I assure you that it fares well in the end.”

  Still, she didn’t speak. Misery seeped out of her, and he found himself searching for something that would make the tenseness that was bunching her shoulders to ebb. “I tell you this—if Hoel doesn’t kill me, then I will assess this husband of yours. I’ll know what to look for; see if he’s one of our kind. I really think, however, that it’s just your mind playing tricks on you.”

  This seemed to relieve her tension somewhat. Eventually she replied doubtfully, “You’re not really going to check him, are you? If you think I’m just acting mad, then you’re coming in with bias.”

  “No, no. I promise you at more than one occasion I’ve had to even be wrong about something. I’ll assess the man with a completely open mind,” he told her. “Just be a good girl for me until we get to Hoel’s, and in return, you have my word that I will do my very best to evaluate this warlord to see if he’s merely holding up a sort of façade.”

  She grumbled, “I have no reason to trust a wizard.”

  He frowned and shook his head, “I have never heard a witch speak so poorly of our own race before. Believe it or not, we’re not all bad. I’d like to think that I have a reputation of being a decent sort of fellow. I’m someone people can take at his word.”

  “I’ve been told the exact opposite, and so far, my experience hasn’t been too contrary…” she hummed, sounding like she wanted to believe differently.

  “What’s your name, girl?” he asked her softly.

  After hesitating for a moment, she replied, “Maili.”

  He recognized that name of meaning ‘Born of the Sea’ in an ancient language. It was an interesting one for a witch, since magi didn’t normally have much to do with the water any longer; the only factions they had were extinct, now. “You don’t have to trust me, Maili. I’m just making the offer. I have to take you to Hoel. He might hate me, but he’s inspired me. His goodness is well-known, and it’s my pleasure to be able to be of some service to him.”

  She let out a frustrated puff of air. “Well, fine then. Fine, I need your word. I need your word that you’ll take a good look at Damen,
and do whatever you have to that would prove him a wizard. I assure you I’m not wrong about this!”

  With a satisfied grin, he replied, “My word is my bond. Does that mean you’ll cooperate?”

  She grumbled. “I won’t leap off the horse and over the first nearby cliff, if that’s what you mean,” she replied.

  “Good, so I’m going to untie you now that we seem to have an understanding,” he told her, hoping his serious tone alone would warn her to behave. “I do not want you to even attempt running from me.” He pulled his knife from his boot and began to cut through her rope ties.

  “Fine,” she snipped. “Either I’ll succeed or nothing.”

  He stopped cutting her rope for a moment and she groaned and shook her hands toward the air. “Learn to take a joke, wizard.”

  “That didn’t sound much like a joke,” he complained, beginning again to cut through the rope, then shucking the strand to the ground. “Jokes are supposed to be funny.”

  “Well, I’m a little sleep-deprived, so perhaps my delivery’s off. Or because I’m being held against my will. One of the two.”

  “You have to realize that what I believe you’re going through—the imagining—is common. Girls commonly imagine things under duress. Marriage is not short of duress, I can imagine. Never been married myself, just to avoid it.”

  “Well, then I’d really be in trouble,” she replied simply, readjusting herself in the saddle to be comfortable. Her back pressed up against him, making him feel warm all along his front.

  She smelt good, like cinnamon and salt from the ocean. There was also something else in her scent that he couldn’t place. It was familiar, but unrecognizable. “Why is that?” he asked conversationally.

  “Because I stabbed him in the neck with a hairpin before I left last night.”

  That was unsettling. He had to admit, he hadn’t expected something like that out of her. She might have looked mischievous, but not malicious. Maybe she was insane, not just addled.

  Actually, who else but the utterly insane would stab someone with a hairpin? That sounded absolutely barbaric! He found himself swallowing deeply at the thought of such a thing. “Ah, well… I’m sure Hoel would forgive you, anyway. If you’re lucky, maybe this Damen doesn’t even want you anymore.”

  “I doubt that. It’s not exactly a love-match.”

  “Love tends to grow slowly over time,” he told her, though he was less than sure about that. He’d only ever been in love once, and he very much confused it with hate for half a year. When he did start loving her, it wasn’t a growth as much as it was recognition of his true feelings.

  “Not with people who want to enslave you,” she assured him in a slow, deliberate drawl, like he was the one who was crazy enough to shank someone in the neck with a hair implement.

  He dropped the issue, forcing himself not to sigh as he broke the conversation. They weren’t getting anywhere with this logic. He’d just get her there, see that her relationship with Hoel was truly as she claimed, and then he’d deliver her to him. After that, he would step back from what was obviously a family matter.

  They rode in silence for maybe an hour. She didn’t make any noise. For a while he thought she was sleeping. When a carriage, old and rickety, came toward them, she straightened. She seemed to recognize the carriage drivers, which was a surprise—they were the very grimy and tough sort. One had an eye patch, and the other seemed like he was missing fingers.

  The closer they came, the sooner Ashcroft realized that it was a prisoner’s carriage. They were probably carrying prisoners to work the spice mines about a day and a half further up the road. They stopped their horses, saying, “Oy! There you are!” one of them said, smiling with an uneven row of teeth. He was looking at the girl. “You’ve got the house in an uproar. We just came from there. You have your father and half an army out looking high and low for you! Surprised they haven’t caught you yet.”

  The girl swung off the horse before he moved to stop her. “So am I.” She searched in her satchel and looked for a canteen. Ashcroft jumped off his horse, his mouth open to protest.

  “Don’t go giving them water,” one of the guards complained, rolling his eyes. He locked eyes with Ashcroft. “Don’t waste your canteen on this lot. They’re going right to the mines.”

  “Did you water and feed them when you stopped by the house?” she called from the back. He saw her passing a canteen to dirty, outstretched arms.

  “They’re not daisies!” the guards cried. “They’re criminals. Tried and sold.”

  Maili reached into her satchel and handed over a parcel, looking to be a small loaf of bread, to another set of outstretched arms. Groans of gratification met Ashcroft’s ears. He stepped forward, pulling the horse, and watched her order the prisoners to share with each other.

  He blinked. She looked like she had done this a thousand times before. He stepped back toward the guard. “You know her?” he asked them.

  They both nodded. “Yeah,” Eyepatch said. “‘Course. Known her for years. Daughter of the great Hoel there. Pretty as can be, but she’s a bloody pain in the ass, just like the old demon. Always has been. No sense of priority or respect of our duties.”

  Ashcroft felt a sense of relief, even excitement. At least she was who she said she was. “How do you know her?” he asked, this time just out of curiosity.

  “Hoel supports our work,” the smaller one, missing a finger, replied. “He lets us stop, gives us a free meal. Sometimes we sleep the night there in the stables. He shows us real hospitality, ‘cept that then the devils go an’ try to primp our prisoners. It’s not regular to feed and doctor ‘em on the trip, but neither of ‘em won’t let us hear the end of it until they have their way. Personally, I think all that food n’ water just gives ‘em energy to put the fight back into ‘em.”

  “Heard that she ran right out on her husband last night. Right in the middle of the wedding feast,” Eyepatch told him.

  “Heard it was after the wedding feast. Heard she threw a big punchbowl on the poor bloke’s head,” Fingerless corrected his companion, chuckling.

  “Any mention of stabbing?” Ashcroft asked, feel uncomfortable, as if he was gossiping.

  The guards blinked at him. “Wha? No. Little Maili there? She wouldn’t hurt a fly. No, no. In fact, she’d take that fly and put him on a feather pillow and have us all serve it. That’s the way she works. She’s a loon.” Fingerless rolled his eyes.

  “I heard that,” Maili said, stepping back toward the front. “You like me more than you let on.” She put her hands on her hips. “Admit it.”

  “No, we don’t!” Eyepatch defended. “It’s always orders and demands from you, all in. It’s hard enough putting our necks on the line to protect you lot from criminals like them, but you’d have us bowing and serving ‘em if you had your way. An’ I was thinkin’ we wouldn’t have to bother with you or Hoel’s nonsense with this lot since he’s been out lookin’ for you. Can’t wait until you get home. You’re going to get yourself a proper tannin’, is what’s finally gonna happen. And it’s all of your own making! Ungrateful, silly thing you are.”

  With that, they cracked the reins and continued along, kicking up dust in their wake. They weren’t exactly polite to the girl, but Ashcroft was able to turn and see the prisoners go by, giving their thanks to the girl graciously. Probably that was a bit of hope that they needed.

  The girl turned and looked at Ashcroft. “Are you going to help me back up?” she demanded, pointing to the horse.

  He grunted but didn’t bother giving her a boost. She was light enough that, even though she squeaked with surprise, he put his hands around her hips and easily hoisted her right up on the horse’s back. She shook her head and sighed and scootched forward as he got up behind her. “You’re stronger than you look,” she mentioned. By her tone he wondered if she didn’t think his strength was a good thing.

  Ashcroft grinned, somewhat glad that she’d noticed.

  “What were
you before you were a wizard?” she asked.

  “Do you ask what a fish used to be before he was a fish? Or a bird before he was a bird? I was always a wizard. What a silly question,” he grumbled. He glanced behind him at the carriage one more time and kicked the horse into a trot. “Why did you feed and water the prisoners?”

  She shrugged. “Well, papa used to feed the carriers but not the prisoners—he’s very big on justice and crime and punishment and all that rubbish—but I feel sorry for them. It’s like they stopped being human just because they’ve done wrong. And they haven’t. They’re just the same as we are; made of flesh and blood. Besides, I’m not going to say I’ve never stolen gold from my father’s purse. He just didn’t make me work in the spice mines for thirty years after he caught me at it. He’s certainly never withheld food or water from me… anyway, he’s come to my way of thinking. He’s been helping me feed them for probably more than ten years, now.”

  He pursed his lips. She was an enigma, but probably a crazy one. He couldn’t imagine that a girl with compassion like that would have just gone and stabbed a man in the neck, so now Ashcroft couldn’t even believe that she’d done that, either. It was silly to think she would; Hoel’s guards would have heard a stabbing and would have stopped it. Surely, the news would have at least made it to their servants, and the story would have spread like wildfire. The good news was that at least she was apparently harmless.

  He couldn’t make up his mind about her. She seemed very kind and reasonable one moment, the next she was a brat, and then the next she was spewing a bunch of insane babble.

  “Why is taking me back so important to you?” she asked him, her tone dry.

  He didn’t see the reason for lying. “I’ve always wanted to gain audience with Hoel, and his attention’s not an easy feat for one as myself. Although I do support the act of returning lost things to people. He’s probably worried sick that after you ran away something happened to you.” That’s what Ashcroft would have worried about, at least! Of course, Westeryn wasn’t anywhere near as dangerous as the Northland realm, where Ashcroft’s tower still stood, but anything could happen on these roads. Bandits, marauders, rapists… Hell, even the woods had their own dangers…