Twenty

The little group made it to the mountains quickly. Nara led them to a small alcove carved into a tunnel wall. She placed her torch into a notch in the wall and ushered Lothar and Devyn inside.

“We’re to wait for the Boss here,” she said in a hushed tone, “He should be here before nightfall.”

Devyn nodded even though worry squeezed her heart to the point of pain, “I hope everyone got out alright.”

“I’m sure they did, Miss,” Lothar replied soothingly.

Time passed so slowly. Lothar and Nara spent most of it speaking to each other quietly. Devyn sat with her knees tucked up to her chest on the floor of the alcove, watching the flickering torchlight dance over the rocks. Each minute felt like hours as she waited for any sign of Emmerich’s return.

Eventually, Nara got up and left the alcove. She returned minutes later with a fresh torch and a deep frown on her face. Replacing the torch, she stepped back inside the cavity and planted herself next to the princess.

“The sun’s gone down,” she said after a beat of silence.

Devyn’s stomach lurched, “Any sign of him?” Nara shook her head.

“If he doesn’t return by morning, we will have to move on without him. I know where he was planning on heading next. Maybe…maybe he went on ahead.”

“I don’t think he did.”

“What makes you say that?”

When Devyn hesitated, Lothar spoke up, “Call it a gut feeling.”

The ghost of a smile appeared on Devyn’s lips. He certainly wasn’t wrong.

“Try and get some sleep, you’ll need all the strength you can get either way.” Nara patted Devyn’s shoulder before moving farther back into the alcove where Lothar sat.

Sleep didn’t come easy for anyone. All three were hyper aware of every noise and movement, anxious for Emmerich’s return. Devyn lay on the hard earthen floor of the tiny cave with her hands behind her head dozing on and off, her dreams plagued by images of violence and death. More than once, she awoke covered in a clammy, cold sweat.

She was abruptly pulled from one such dream by the scent of vetiver and jasmine, topped by the metallic tang of blood. She sat up straight and looked around. Lothar and Nara were both still asleep, huddled close for warmth. Devyn blew out a sharp sigh. She must have imagined it.

She settled back down and closed her eyes once more when she heard her name being called. She shot up again, “Hello?” she hissed.

“Devyn.” the voice called again. She crawled out of the alcove, grabbing the torch from its notch and taking a few tentative steps.

“Red…hurry.”

The voice was Emmerich’s. And it was in her head. She stood completely still as the realization came over her that she was hearing the Wolf inside her mind. A small raspy noise echoed through the tunnel, and Devyn took off toward it. Everything in her screamed to get to him. Faster, she pleaded with herself, willing her legs to work harder.

She rounded a bend in the tunnel and stopped short at the sight. Emmerich was slumped on the ground. Blood ran in streaks down the wall next to him, as if he’d tried to catch himself on it and was unable to stay upright. He was paler than she had ever seen him, even in the warmth of the firelight.

“What happened?” she gasped, running to kneel beside him.

He stirred like he was trying to get up, but only managed to lift his face to look at her, “The usual.”

Devyn scowled at him, “The usual? You’re bleeding out!”

She set the torch aside and began searching for the source of his bleeding. It wasn’t easy to determine with the feeble amount of light she had to work with, and she resorted to gently running her hands over Emmerich’s body. She could feel him shivering under her touch—she had to act fast.

“I wish I had my bag. I have some yarrow that I could use to help stop the bleeding,” she muttered as her hands trailed up and down his legs.

Emmerich hissed in response, and she knew she had found the wound she was searching for. She brought the torch closer and saw a large tear in the fabric of his pant leg. The cloth around it was soaked in blood. Glancing at him, she ripped the tear open wider to get a better look. She expected him to make some kind of off color remark, but he barely acknowledged the action.

“Emmerich, you need to stay awake,” she instructed as she inspected his wound. It was as bad as she feared.

His thigh appeared to have been slashed with some sort of blade. A stream of blood erupted from the gash in spurts, telling Devyn that an artery had most likely been hit. She prayed it had only been nicked.

“Emmerich, I have to go back for my bag. I’ll bring Nara with me,” she said.

He stopped her as she rose to her feet, “Don’t go.”

Her heart strained even more like it’d been put in a vice. She knew he’d die without help, but his pleas were almost too much for her to bear, “I need supplies. I can’t help you without the herbs in my bag.”

“You can if you try.”

“What?”

“Make what you need. Create it.”

Devyn stared at him. He had to be worse off than she thought, “I can’t do that.”

“Yes, you can,” he paused to catch his breath, “think of the plant you need and will it to grow.”

“Emmerich—”

“There’s no time, Red. Please just trust me.”

She did trust him. In the very marrow of her bones, she trusted him. So, she did as she was told and thought of what she needed. Yarrow. She pictured the plant in her mind, the tall hairy stalk crowned with flat topped clusters of tiny white flowers. Bees and butterflies loved the plant. She imagined the way it used to sway in the wind in her cottage garden. How it felt fuzzy against her fingers when she harvested it. She closed her eyes to savor the memory and felt a prickly kind of warmth spread through her body and settle in her hands.

She held them out, hovering over the ground. After a moment, nothing happened and Devyn could feel disappointment being to poke its way into the corners of her mind, “It’s not working.”

“It will.” Emmerich wheezed.

Devyn thought harder, silently commanding the plant to grow. Suddenly, she felt the ground beneath them begin to quake, and a green shoot popped up. She gasped as she watched it grow taller and taller before her eyes. Flower buds appeared, blooming into perfect clusters. She dropped her hands to her sides, gaping at the thing she’d created.

Emmerich tried to smile, “Good girl.”

Her eyes snapped back to him. She ripped the top of the plant off the stalk and shoved it into her mouth, leaves and all. She chewed, grimacing at the astringent taste, and spat out a wad of macerated plant matter into her hands. Pushing aside the shredded fabric of Emmerich’s pants, she pressed the poultice into the wound. The Wolf howled in pain, but Devyn kept even pressure on his leg.

“That was a little on the nose, don’t you think?” Devyn quipped.

He stared at her for a long moment before grinning weakly, “Someone’s got jokes, eh?”

“Just trying to lighten the mood,” she replied, “I still don’t know how we’re going to get you the treatment you need. This poultice isn’t going to heal your leg. It’ll only stop some of the bleeding.”

“I need Nara. She can heal me.”

“She’s got magic?”

He nodded, “She is one of the last in a long line of magical healers. I recruited her after her parents went into the palace and didn’t come out again.”

The information weighed on Devyn’s heart like a rock, “Well I can’t leave you here like this. The wound needs pressure on it for the poultice to be effective. I doubt you have enough strength to hold it as tightly as you’d need to.”

Emmerich gripped his long sleeve near the shoulder and pulled hard, ripping it from his arm, “Use this to tie around my leg.”

“Good thinking, it’ll act as a kind of tourniquet too.” she took the fabric and wrapped it around his thigh, tying it there as tight as she could. Emmerich winced but didn’t cry out.

“I’ll be right back, okay?” she said. She quickly stood and ran back the way she had come.

“NARA!” Devyn bellowed as she approached the hollow in the tunnel wall.

The petite woman sprang out. Devyn could barely make her out in the darkness—she had forgotten the torch next to Emmerich, “Nara come quickly, it’s—”

“Go, show me where he is,” she commanded. Devyn turned on her heel and sprinted toward the spot where she’d left the Wolf.

Soon, she heard another set of feet pounding against the rocky ground behind her. Lothar had joined them. She rounded the last curve and threw herself aside to give Nara quicker access to Emmerich. Nara didn’t skip a beat. She plowed ahead and crashed to her knees in front of him, looking him over.

“It’s his left leg!” Devyn barked.

Lothar came up to the princess, clearly winded and more than a little confused, “What happened?”

“He wasn’t fine after all.” she shrugged, masking the anger that was beginning to bubble up within her with sarcasm.

Lothar knew better, “Miss when I said that I didn’t think—”

“It doesn’t matter.” she snapped.

He fell silent, turning to watch Nara work. She sat on her knees before Emmerich, gently prodding around the wound on his thigh. He sucked a breath in through his teeth and she covered the gash firmly with her hand. A moment later, a soft blue light glowed under the spot she touched.

“Just breathe through the pain. I’ll be done in a minute.” Emmerich growled from deep in his throat but stayed still. He balled his hands into fists, squeezing tight enough that Devyn was sure he’d drawn blood.

The seconds ticked by. No one moved, afraid that if they so much as coughed, Nara’s concentration would be broken and Emmerich would bleed out. Devyn stared into the darkness of the tunnel beyond them, not really seeing anything. Terror, pure and undiluted, flooded her body. Her heart raced as though it was trying to come out of her chest. Images of her mother’s final agonizing moments forced their way into her mind’s eye. Was she about to lose another person she cared for?

And she did care for Emmerich—if she wasn’t sure of that before, she was now. She couldn’t place when exactly he’d made a place for himself in her heart, but seeing him sprawled out on the ground, feeling the stickiness of his drying blood on her shaking hands…somehow, he had breached all her walls without her even noticing.

“Alright, this will do for the time being, but we need to get you somewhere to rest. We won’t all fit inside the alcove.” Nara said after what felt like hours, leaning back on her heels and working out a kink in her neck.

Emmerich cringed as he tried to stand. Both Nara and Devyn rushed to keep him on the ground. Nara glanced in Devyn’s direction and retreated, the hint of a smile touching her lips.

Devyn crashed to her knees at his side, “Don’t try getting up on your own! That’s how you got into the mess you’re in. You’ve lost too much blood, let us help you.”

Emmerich managed a weak grin, “You worry too much, Red.”

“You don’t worry enough.” she hissed.

“Ah, you may have a point,” he laid his hand on hers, “I might have bitten off more than I could chew this time.”

“Is that even possible?” Lothar asked.

The Wolf chuckled, “I appreciate the vote of confidence Roth, but even I have my limitations. The run-of-the-mill soldier is generally no sweat, but they brought the boy duke along and he seemed to have it out for me specifically. At one point he had me pretty well backed into a corner, but I managed to get away. He left me with this lovely parting gift though.”

Rainart. He’d come after them, after her. He’d tried to kill Emmerich. Devyn felt chilled from the inside out like ice had been poured into her very core.

“Scorned lover?” Nara wondered aloud.

Devyn bristled at the term, “Hardly.”

“Hardly isn’t no…” Nara put her hands up in surrender when the princess shot a murderous glare her way.

“We aren’t lovers. Any attraction was superficial at best,” Devyn couldn’t ignore the way Emmerich’s eyes shuttered at her words like he knew she wasn’t being entirely truthful, “at least on my part.”

“Let’s get you up, boss,” Nara said, saving Devyn from digging herself a deeper hole.

Lothar and Nara came around Emmerich and Devyn backed up a step or two, not willing to leave his side entirely. They hooked their arms under his and hoisted the man to his feet. He swayed for a moment as he caught his balance.

“That was quite the rush,” he murmured.

Nara switched places with Devyn once they thought he was steady enough. She took up the torch and led the way through the tunnels, keeping a slow pace. The group took frequent breaks to let Emmerich catch his breath or to drink from a canteen that Devyn had in her pack.

Eventually, they came to another hollowed out space in the tunnel wall. This one was twice the size of the previous alcove and featured a large slab carved out of the earth that could serve as a makeshift bed for Emmerich to rest on. Nara anchored the torch in the outer wall while Devyn and Lothar laid the Wolf down and sank to the floor beside him.

“Now what?” Devyn asked.

“I heal quickly,” Emmerich explained, “we can get moving again in a few hours.”

Nara settled down next to Lothar and leaned her head against the dirt wall, letting her eyelids slide shut. Devyn twisted to face Emmerich, straining to make out the planes of his face in the faint light the torch outside the alcove provided.

“How are you feeling?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

“Other than incredibly irritated? Alright.”

“Why are you irritated?”

“Because I was arrogant, and it cost me. I shouldn’t have underestimated the duke, especially after I caught his scent.”

“What do you mean?”

Emmerich took a deep breath, “I have heightened senses even when I’m not in my wolf form. Everyone has an individual, unique scent and if I smell that scent, I don’t forget it. Ever. I’ve scented the duke before.”

Devyn remained silent and he continued, “The night that you were attacked in the forest. He was the one who was after you.”

“I was afraid you were going to say that,” she replied.

Emmerich tried to roll onto his side to get closer to Devyn, wincing with the effort. She threw out a hand to stop him and climbed into the makeshift bed with him and kneeled at his head. She lifted him up a little and scooted closer, allowing him to rest his head in her lap.

“Are you…okay?” he asked sheepishly, making Devyn’s heart squeeze. She supposed he expected her to be shocked. She supposed she ought to be, but for some reason, she wasn’t. More than anything, she felt betrayed. Rainart had told her he was falling in love with her. He’d kissed her whenever he’d gotten the chance. He said he wanted to help her, yet he’d sided with the queen. He had tried to murder her—he would have if it hadn’t been for Emmerich showing up at the last second.

“What kind of person confesses their love to someone and then tries to kill them?” she wondered aloud.

She felt Emmerich’s shoulders go rigid and looked down at him. His eyes were glowing as he stared straight up.

“He said he’s in love with you?” the question came out with a snarl.

Devyn’s heart hammered in her chest, “He said he thought he was falling for me. But clearly, he was lying. I’ll kill him.”

“Not if I kill him first.”

She bit her lip to keep from grinning, “We can do it together, then.”

Silence stretched between them for some time. The soft, even sounds of Nara and Lothar’s breathing filled the space. They had fallen asleep. Devyn glanced toward them—Nara’s head rested on Lothar’s shoulder, and his hand covered hers. The princess smiled at the pair.

“Red, I have to ask,” Emmerich finally said, “were—are you—in love with the duke?”

Devyn brought her gaze back to him, “Would it bother you if I was?”

He watched her, his eyes like liquid mercury boring into her like he was trying to search her soul.

She brushed her fingers over his brow, smoothing the worry lines that showed, “I was serious when I said my attraction to him was superficial. He was the first man to show any kind of romantic interest in me, and it was…thrilling. I’m not in love with him.”

Emmerich let out a sigh and she could feel him relax, “That’s good to hear. I won’t need to feel guilty when I run my sword through his gut.”

“I just don’t understand why he’d turn on me like this.”

“Fear is a powerful motivator. I wouldn’t doubt that the queen has something she’s holding over him that’s forcing him to comply.”

Was that really it? Rainart did have family in his home territory of Torende. Perhaps Valda was threatening his family or their lands unless he did her dirty work. Or maybe he had simply lied about his feelings the entire time and was just trying to wheedle his way into her heart to make keeping tabs on her easier. He had known that Lothar was helping her train and even though he’d promised to keep their secret, Valda had somehow found out. They had been careful not to be discovered for years and Devyn had a feeling that it wasn’t a mere coincidence that they were only recently caught. Either way, he’d made his choice. And with that choice, he’d made enemies of both her and Emmerich.

“Do you have a plan? For what comes next, I mean. How are we supposed to get justice for Mama now that we’re on the run?” Devyn asked.

“The first step is to ruin the public image of the queen. We can shore up the evidence you’ve gathered, and make sure it’s all verifiable. Then we’ll make sure every person in Malvan sees it. It’ll be much easier to take her down if there’s no one willing to stand in the way.”

“You’ve thought a lot about this, haven’t you?”

“Every day since the day my family was torn apart.”

“I’m sorry.”

“You have nothing to be sorry for.”

“My family destroyed yours. Of course, I have a reason to be sorry.”

Emmerich lifted his head off of her lap and sat up to face her, “No. You aren’t your family. You aren’t Valda. Her choices don’t get lumped onto you just because you share a bloodline.”

“Still,” Devyn said sadly, “I can’t help but feel guilty.”

“I know Red but trust me, I don’t blame you for what I’ve lost,” he leaned in toward her and covered her hand with his. She dropped her head and sighed wearily, “You need to rest. Lay down and sleep, I’ll keep watch.”

Devyn’s head snapped up and she gaped at him, “You’re the one who was just at death’s door! You need to rest more than I do.”

“I told you, I’m a quick healer. I’m alright,” he said, pulling her down onto her back, “Get some sleep.”

Devyn seized his wrist as he made to get up, “Please, stay. You don’t have to sleep, but at least let your body recover. There’s enough room for the both of us.”

“You want to sleep with me Red?” Emmerich asked, looking back at her with an arched brow.

Her face flushed crimson and she was grateful that there was almost no light in the little room, “Don’t be so crude.”

He chuckled as he lowered himself back down to lie next to the princess, “Don’t be so uptight. Of course, I’ll lay here with you.”

He laid on his back and tucked one arm under his head. After a moment, Devyn curled into his side, nestling her head against him. He wrapped his other arm around her and began to idly play with the strands of her hair that had managed to escape from her braid.

It took almost no time for Devyn to fall fast asleep. Emmerich glanced down at the top of her head when he noticed her breathing becoming more even and smiled tenderly.

“I could get used to this,” he whispered into the dark.