The ever-pervasive stench of the swamp as vegetable and animal matter slowly rotted filled Ramiro’s nose. Covering his face or holding his breath did no good when surrounded by the foul water. There was no escape from it any more than he could avoid the burn of the sun. If there was one positive, the smell nullified the rank stink of his body odor.
Thank the saints for small favors.
As the hours wore away, so did his irritation, replaced with a dull numbness that sank through skin to muscle and bone. The numbness of exhaustion settled deep and ran from his toes to his hair, encompassing his brain in a foggy haze until nothing existed but the reek and the urge to find dry land. Even Teresa no longer attempted to engage him in conversation, riding slumped against Sancha’s neck. The witch lay upon Teresa’s back—in either a siesta or a swoon, Ramiro cared not which.
As the reed-lined bank of the eastern shore drew nearer and nearer and the water shallower, Ramiro fought within himself to stay on his feet and not crawl onto the waterless land like a bebé. His legs wanted to collapse, and his spirit, sunk so low, agreed with the idea. Only pride kept him upright as he led the horses out of the water and into a clearing of matted grasses, scraggly bushes, and a scattering of white-clad birch trees. Frogs greeted their safe return to land by springing for the water with muffled plops.
“We can camp here,” he said, not even bothering to shake off the fetid liquid clinging to him.
Teresa slid down from Sancha with a groan of relief. At the same time, the little witch came to life, springing off the far side of Sancha’s flank. She dashed for the safety of the trees with a flash of long braid. For a split second, Ramiro’s mind staggered, unable to comprehend. Then came the dull thought that he could let her go and be done with her. Stand still, and he could wave good riddance to one trouble.
What was one more failure?
“Hell and damnation!”
He threw down the reins and dodged around his horse to hustle after her. He couldn’t blame her for the escape attempt—who wouldn’t do the same?—but they didn’t have time for it.
The rope still hugged Teresa’s middle. The witch must have worked her end loose over the long, miserable ride. What surprised him more than that, though, was her speed. The girl could run.
But so could he.
He caught her just before she broke past the edge of trees not far from the water’s edge, grabbing a fistful of her hair and dragging them both to a halt. Her arms remained lashed together, her skin red and swollen from the leather straps. Somehow, the sight brought up his anger.
“That was stupid,” he shouted, swinging her around. “Never try it again unless you want me to thrash you.”
Her odd blue eyes shot defiance and anger, while her garbled shouts from under the gag were better left unheard. He almost slapped her as if she were a spoiled child—and the thought disgusted him. Hitting a woman, witch or no . . . that wasn’t the man Ramiro wanted to be, no matter what threat he might make. Mustering his control, he marched her back to their camp, where Teresa handed him the rope that had recently bound her to the witch.
He couldn’t resist a taunt as he made sure her gag was secure. “You should have worked this free and used your magic on us instead of running. I guess you’re too stupid to realize that.” Without looking at the witch’s face, he lashed her securely to a slender birch, then turned his back on both his guilt and her and went to Valentía.
Where he hesitated. Finally, he reached out, but even then, his fingers fumbled on the bonds that would release Salvador’s body. He wanted to hide his head against Valentía’s flank, hide from the truth, but someone had to set up a camp.
“I’m sorry, cousin,” Teresa said, coming to stand next to him. “I should have kept a better watch on her.” She turned around, showing him her back. “Untie my sling. I want to help, and two hands would be more useful.”
“But your injury,” he protested. “You shouldn’t be doing this.”
“Let me decide. It’s not broken, and you need help.” She gestured at the horses waiting to be cared for. “Besides, it is a danger to me to be one-handed here. The knot, cousin.”
Water and tension had worked their power on the material of the knot, forming it into a tight mass, so Ramiro pulled out the knife from his boot and sliced through the fabric in a smooth tug.
Teresa hesitantly swung her arm, bending and flexing while her brow contorted with evident pain. A forced smile crossed her face. “Not nearly as bad as I expected. Hardly a twinge,” she lied. She jerked her head at the witch. “You’ll have to deal with her sometime. You can’t deny her existence forever.”
“I’m not denying her existence,” he said. “I’m loathing it.” Yet even as he said it, a pang cut at Ramiro as he remembered the welts on the witch’s arms, the bruising on her throat. This rough, brutish behavior wasn’t him, but maybe it was a new version of him. After all, Teresa had lost the laughing and jesting countenance she’d showed the world ever since he met her. None of them was untouched by change during this cursed journey. But the thought frightened him.
Trying to shake that thought, Ramiro worked at the straps covering his brother. Blankets could conceal Salvador and shut out the sight of his brother’s mangled body, but it couldn’t change the truth. Just as denying the facts would only lead to further pain and fail to solve anything.
“Think, brother,” Salvador would urge.
He had to face the situation sometime. Painful as it was to admit, the witch had used a magic that made them attack one another. Best of friends since childhood, and still they’d been unable to see through the cloud in their minds and resist her. Common sense shouted that sort of magic turned on the Northerners could swing the tide in their favor.
Common sense shouted they needed the little witch.
If, he thought, the slender twig of a girl actually had the same magic. Because for all this effort and their assumptions of her power, so far she’d shown none. Ramiro might infinitely prefer she never did, but Colina Hermosa needed it otherwise. He looked at Teresa.
“Dealing with her is last on my list,” he said curtly, and went back to his somber task.
Together they freed Salvador’s body from its confinement and laid it in the driest spot they could find. Then, while Teresa collected dry wood and prepared what food remained, he tended the caballos de guerra, finding a thin stream that trickled relatively clear into the swamp lake for them to drink. Ramiro’s own tongue was gummed to the inside of his mouth with thirst. By the way Teresa attacked her canteen, she felt the same. They’d have to boil more water for tomorrow.
He lifted his canteen to his lips and caught the witch staring at him fixedly with her red-rimmed eyes. A hint of pleading entered them. Ramiro cursed himself for a fool. The witch would have to drink and eat sometime. Dread ran through him. That meant lifting her gag.
Apparently last on his list had come sooner than he’d like.
The horses grazed free on marsh grass, and a fire crackled happily at the center of the murderer’s tidy camp. It held the gathering dusk at bay, except where Claire slumped against the tree at the edge of the light. There was nothing happy or content in her position, though at least the rough feel of the tree’s bark was less intrusive than the straps around her body. At first her arms had throbbed and burned, but now they’d gone dead, a lifeless weight. With her arms numb, thirst was the prime pain that tortured her. Her throat already sore from the throttling, it now ached with a double torment, while the gag acted like a sponge to absorb the little moisture her mouth could produce and stole it away.
Thirst and fear.
She held back a shiver. The two murderers knelt opposite, favoring her with their unwanted attention. The peasant woman sat with hands neatly folded in her lap as if the damp ground didn’t deter her. She sat so close their knees almost touched. The youth, on the other hand, kept a distance between them. He held a canteen, the sight of which made her throat work, while a knife rested on his bent thigh.
“Tell us what we want to know and you get this.” He held the canteen before her eyes, taunting her with its proximity.
The murderer had handled her as easily as if she were a newborn goat. He’d moved with a fluid grace, compared to her floundering run. Stopping her flight had given him no trouble, and the idea terrified her. Even if she escaped, he’d find her again. Primal determination shone from his eyes whenever he condescended to look at her.
His meaning was no great mystery. He wanted to know about the Song. Her mind raced, trying to decide what to tell him. Did she admit everything? Say she had no magic in the hopes they let her go? Say nothing? She searched her brain for the advice Mother would give, but came up with nothing.
He seemed to sense her intention to lie. Holding up the canteen, he said, “Give me any trouble, and you can go without until we get back to Colina Hermosa.”
“Really, Ramiro,” the peasant woman Teresa said. “We’re not barbarians.”
“We are what the world makes us.”
“But, through the saints’ grace, we can strive to be more than that.”
He scowled and picked up the knife. “Hold still,” he directed Claire.
She shrank against the tree, but he seized her bound arms in one hand and brought up the knife with the other. She closed her eyes, only to feel tugs as her arms pulled at her shoulders. Opening one eye revealed him using the tip of the knife to wiggle lose the knot on her bindings. The leather thongs came away, and, for a moment, Claire felt nothing. Then blood rushed back, proving her arms weren’t dead—far from it. She writhed against the tree as pain bloomed in her wrists like sharp, tingling daggers.
How had this happened? She wanted to go home. The goats. Who would tend them now? Her mother. The deep ache in her chest stirred to life, leaving her feeling so alone. Why had she ever wished to leave home? To test the Song? This day proved there was no one to save her. No one to care.
She sobbed.
Oh so gradually, the agony lifted. The world stopped whirling, and she heard a rough, keening moan coming from her gagged mouth. Hot mortification flooded her skin, but she forced her head upright.
Did she imagine the hint of satisfaction in the murderer’s eyes? There and gone in an instant, it allowed her to reclaim her hate. She reached for him to scratch out those eyes, but the rope binding her to the tree wouldn’t allow her to reach.
He held aloft the canteen again. “Tell me what I want to know.”
She let her arms drop. Fighting solved nothing. Not with thirst twisting her thoughts. Without water, she’d soon be good for nothing. Without water, her escape chances went from slim to zero. There would be other chances to show her resistance.
“Ramiro.” Teresa frowned. “Don’t torture her like that.”
The murderer shrugged. “Listen well, witch. I’ll give you water when you tell us if you have the voice magic. I’ll even feed you. When I lift your gag, you’ll make no attempt to cloud our minds. You’ll say nothing unless asked, not unless you want to go without. Is my point clear?”
Claire nodded, having no doubt he was capable of anything.
He leaned close, and she smelled swamp and sweat and something musky but not unpleasant, like a mix of cedar shavings and leather. His hands fumbled in her hair, and the pressure around her head vanished. She lifted trembling hands to her face and touched welts at the corners of her mouth.
The murderer held her gag as if posed to replace it. “Do you have the magic?”
Her attempt to speak came out as a dry croak. Did they really fear she’d sing when she could barely get her swollen tongue to move?
“Cousin,” the peasant woman remonstrated. “We’ll get nothing this way.”
The murderer put the canteen in Claire’s hands. She grasped it with difficulty, surprised to see her hand shake. The water was flat and warm. Pure heaven.
Before she could manage a second swallow, he plucked it away. Claire held what was left in her mouth, letting it soothe her parched tongue.
“You want more?” the murderer said. “Tell us. Do you have magic?”
The peasant Teresa shifted in the flattened grass. “We need magic to stop the Northerners. To turn the minds of their army so we can act to save our people. Just as the other witch acted to save you.”
The youth frowned but sat quiet.
Claire’s gaze turned to the canteen on his knee. To get more water . . . “Some,” she admitted, raw throat robbing her words of music. “I have. Some magic.”
“Some?” the murderer asked. His eyes hardened. “What kind of answer is that?”
“Please—” Saying such a word to them shamed her, but her mouth was a desert, killing her by inches. “Please water. I’ll. Answer.”
The peasant Teresa brought out a second canteen from behind her back and handed it over without even receiving a nod of permission. Didn’t city men dominate the women? This one argued and acted on her own often enough. It went against everything Claire knew about city people. Was their relationship typical or extraordinary?
But the answers to those questions were nothing compared to the need for water, and Claire drank like a glutton, trying to get as much down as possible before they took it away again.
“Well?” he said.
By his tone Claire knew he expected her to go back on her promise. Maybe hoped she would so he could make good on his threat to withhold future drink. She reluctantly let Teresa take back the water. They would not believe she had no magic. Yet claiming to have the full ability could be a potentially lethal lie. What if they forced her to use it? She could not defeat an army even if she wanted to do so.
“The magic grows as a woman matures. I do not have my full power.”
“Because you’re young,” Teresa prompted.
Claire nodded. “I could not work it against hundreds of people. Not successfully, anyway.”
“The Northerner army is tens of thousands,” the murdered said. “Not hundreds.”
Claire gaped. Thousands. Could there be so many people? She tried, but could not picture it. Why hadn’t her mother warned her of their numbers? Her strength, revived somewhat by the water, wilted. So many of these horrible city dwellers. How could she hope to win free against so many? She must make them see her as useless.
“There’s no way thousands could hear me. Your plan is impossible.” She knew from her mother’s tantalizing hints that there were ways to stretch the magic and make it reach farther—running water being one of them, even a thick fog—but she’d never say as much to these city people. Yet, she doubted even an ocean could help her reach thousands. She hadn’t that kind of strength.
Her captors exchanged glances.
“Is it a learned magic?” Teresa asked. “How does it work?”
It cost her nothing to answer such a question. Let the barbarians understand they couldn’t acquire it or use her for their own ends. Maybe then they’d let her go and look for a new method to destroy this army. “It’s inherited from mother to daughter.”
“So witches don’t have sons?”
“Rarely,” Claire said.
“And men are born without the magic?”
Claire nodded. “I cannot stop an army. I’m useless to you.” The murderers didn’t need to know she’d never used the Song against another human. Barely used it at all and knew little of how it worked. Let them retain some fear of her. Perhaps it’d inspire them to let her go sooner.
The murderer leaned close again and returned her gag. Though she tried to wiggle free of his grasp, he pinioned her head and shoulders and tightened the leather around her head. Forcing it into her mouth and restraining her tongue.
“I don’t believe her,” he said. “She’ll say anything to get free.”
“Perhaps.” Teresa tapped the nearly empty canteen against her leg. “But one thing is true. A single voice cannot reach thousands of men. They simply could not hear it, and it’s clearly the only way her power can be released. How does that bode for your father’s plan?”
“Ill.” The murderer stood. “Like we came all this way for nothing. But my duty is to fetch her. We take her back to the city anyway. My father can work out some use for her. And maybe she can lead him to others. Others like the one Salvador killed.”
Frustration hit Claire in a wave, her hands curling into fists. She wanted to strike out at them, claw the indifferent expressions off their faces. But the murderer anticipated her once more. He seized her hands and rewrapped the straps around them, though this time not so tightly.
“Mother to daughter,” Teresa mumbled as she labored to her feet. “Cousin . . . the dead witch must have been her mother.”
Claire squirmed inside, unable to escape the cold pity in their brown eyes. She didn’t want their attention, and she most certainly didn’t want their pity.
“So?” he asked, harshly.
“Your brother. Her mother,” Teresa said. “Ramiro, you know what this means. The two of you are sangre kin. Related by blood. Bound together with the same ties as family. Under obligation to each other.”
What? Claire struggled to understand. She was kin to the murderer under some impossible rite of their city kind? She felt vaguely sick.
The murderer seemed to feel the same. His skin had gone a shade paler than his normal honey brown. “No,” he said through clenched lips. “We’re not.” He turned and stalked toward the swamp lake.