Nine

 

Anahita was naked, covered in blood, and Fakhri came for her again, his body glowing red in the light, his jutting cock as long as he was tall. She screamed, and once she started, she couldn't seem to stop.

A hand came from nowhere, pressing down on her mouth so hard she swore there would be a fresh bruise to add to those Fakhri had already given her. She flailed about, trying to fight her way free.

"Hush, Lady Anahita, you are safe. We swore an oath, but we cannot keep it if you scream so loud everyone in the desert hears you."

She knew that voice. Anahita blinked her eyes open to make sure. Yes, it was Haidar. She blew out a breath she hadn't known she'd been holding. "Thank you," she said shakily. "I dreamed..."

Haidar cut her off. "As we all do." He grimaced. "There are some hours to go before nightfall, when we will travel under the cover of darkness again. Try to sleep, for you will need your strength."

She shook her head. "I cannot. Not after such a dream. If his men come after us..."

"They will not. And even if they do, they will not get past Asad and I," Haidar said.

It was on the tip of her tongue to say that Haidar hadn't been able to protect his own wife, the woman he loved, when Fakhri's men had come for her, but she had no desire to remind the man of his loss. Instead, she said, "I got past you. To kill...to kill..." She couldn't even say the sheikh's name, though she had only to closer her eyes to see his evil grin, gleaming above that monstrous cock.

"You were not a threat," Haidar said.

She glared at him. "Enough of a threat to kill him."

"Because he did not see you as a threat, either," Haidar replied. "If you came at me with a knife, you would not kill me so easily." He gazed at her, as though sizing her up for something. "If you truly do not think you can sleep any more, perhaps you should try." He produced a knife from nowhere and offered it to her, hilt first.

Anahita took it. The blade was barely bigger than her eating knife – much smaller than the one she'd killed her husband with.

Haidar backed out of the tent and beckoned for her to join him. "There is more space for a blade dance out here."

It took Anahita longer to join him, between her broken arm and what she suspected were also broken ribs, but no matter how much she hurt, something within her would not let her back down from this fight. She refused to let any man dictate what she could or could not do, ever again.

She stood for a moment, taking in Haidar's relaxed stance as the afternoon sun set his face aglow. Then she rushed at him, raising the knife above her head.

His arm shot out and slammed against her wrist, sending the blade spinning across the sand.

Her wrist throbbed, already covered in dark bruises from Fakhri, and she cradled it to her chest, fighting back tears. She met Haidar's gaze squarely, refusing to bow her head.

He was the one to look away first, striding across the sand to retrieve his knife. Anahita expected him to tuck it back into its sheath, but he held it out to her instead. When she wrapped her fingers around the hilt, he shook his head. "No, you're holding it wrong. It's easy for someone to knock it out of your hand if you do it like that."

Haidar wrapped a warm hand around hers, showing her how it should be done.

"And don't hold the knife up high like you did just then. He'll see you coming, and have plenty of time to defend himself. Strike from below, like you did the first time. If he doesn't see it coming, he won't block, and your blade will have a better chance of finding its mark. A man rarely looks at what is under his nose, and if you extend the line of his nose down to the ground, you will see where he is blind." He drew a line down his nose and pointed at a spot on the ground. "That is where you lift your blade to do the most damage." He wrapped his hand around Anahita's and brought the blade up to his throat. "Or keep it low, to hit his heart, or his belly." He touched the blade tip to those places on his body, then released her. "Now try it again."

She did, and he corrected her, a sequence they repeated over and over until he was satisfied.

Anahita tried to hand his knife back, but Haidar refused to accept it. Instead, he produced the sheath, and insisted she wear it now she knew how to use it.

"Thank you," she said in wonderment.

"Are you finished with your foolishness now, so that we can be on our way?" Asad asked.

"Teaching her how better to defend herself is not foolishness," Haidar objected.

"She has a broken arm and plenty of other bruises from the bastard's blows. She wouldn't last five minutes in a proper fight." Asad pointed at the fire. "You'd be better off teaching her how to cook. Now that's a more womanly skill."

"She killed a man, with that broken arm, and the other injuries. You couldn't have done it," Haidar said.

Asad shrugged. "I don't have the advantage of being a tiny girl he's beaten into submission more nights than that bastard could count. She surprised him, that's all."

"And us," Haidar said. "You never saw it coming, either, or you wouldn't have let her take your blade. Next time, she may need more than the element of surprise. She's as much a warrior as any of our people were."

"She's not Nasrin," Asad said softly. "Your wife is dead, cousin. Nothing you do now can change that."

Haidar brought up his stubborn chin. "You think I don't know that? That tiny girl avenged Nasrin, and all our people. Her. Not you or me. And she did it after a beating, with a broken arm. That takes courage. You swore to protect her, just as I did. Giving her a blade and training her to use it is part of that oath."

"You're still a fool." Asad turned away to put some more kindling on the fire.

"I'd rather learn to fight than to cook," Anahita said. "I will sleep more soundly for it, even after I am home. Besides, it is Vega and I who do the hunting. It is only fitting that someone else cooks our catch."

Haidar burst out laughing. "The lady is right! A true huntress, and she has trained that bird well."

Anahita considered telling them that she hadn't trained Vega at all, but she wasn't sure how they would react to her ability to speak to animals. Best to keep that a secret a little longer.

"So, shall we practice some more while Asad makes our breakfast?" Anahita ventured with a hopeful smile.

"As my lady commands," Haidar said with a bow. Neither of them paid any attention to Asad's grumbled complaints as he threaded meat onto a knife to cook over the fire.