“You did what?” Amelie asked that night over dinner, incredulous. “You told her to refuse him? Are you insane?”
Céline had been trying for hours to figure out a way to tell her sister what she’d done, and then she’d finally just blurted out that Damek was the intended groom and that she’d counseled Rhiannon not to accept him. But how could she explain it all? Amelie had often expressed unhappiness over the fact that Céline brought in most of their money by playing the seer. How would she feel if Céline told her that some of their mother’s power may indeed have been passed down the line…directly to Céline. Such news might create a barrier between them.
The flames in the hearth cast shadows on the walls, and neither of them had touched the fried lamb chops on the table.
“I had to,” Céline said lamely. “I couldn’t advise her to marry him. Damek is dangerous.”
“Isn’t that the point?” Amelie nearly shouted. “And who do you think he’s going to blame now?” Her face was turning red. “After the way our father and mother both died, didn’t we make a pact to look out only for ourselves?”
That stung, but Céline couldn’t think about their parents. Not tonight. “Just listen,” she said, getting up from the table. Hurrying to one of the shelves, she pulled out a sealed letter hidden between two jars. “I’ve written to Madam Zelinka, and I enclosed the silver coins she gave me. I told her that I counseled Rhiannon to marry Damek with all my best efforts, that I promised her she would be happy, but that she’d already decided against him before arriving, and there was nothing I could do.”
Amelie looked at the letter with the coins sealed inside, but her expression was difficult to read.
“We’ll pay one of the village boys to carry the letter tomorrow, first thing,” Céline rushed on. “Zelinka can’t fault me if she thinks I made my best effort, then returned the money when I failed. Damek probably won’t be ready to give up on Rhiannon yet. He’ll take at least one more run at her, maybe two. By the time he realizes it’s a lost cause, he’ll have forgotten all about us.”
She could see her words calming her sister slowly.
Finally, Amelie nodded. “All right, maybe we can still come out of this alive.” She leaned back in her chair. “But even so, that was a lot of money, Céline. Couldn’t you have just told her to marry him?”
“No,” Céline answered firmly. “I could not.”
As things stood, she’d be having nightmares about Damek smiling while he watched one of his own guards strangling Rhiannon on the bedroom floor. But Céline pushed the image from her mind, went back to her chair, and sat down. She’d done her best to help Rhiannon, and life must go on.
“We should eat these chops before they get cold,” she said. “Do you want bread?”
Amelie nodded, and her silky black hair swung forward and backward as if it had a life of its own. “And you really think we’re safe? That Damek won’t try to punish you?”
“Not if Zelinka shows him my letter, and anyway, punishing me won’t get him what he wants, so why would he bother? This isn’t like someone openly complaining about his lack of leadership. He might even want to keep my involvement hushed up.”
As it turned out, however, she was wrong on all counts, and she never even had a chance to send the letter. Instead, just as she reached for the bread, the blade of a long sword smashed through the shutter of their one front window, and then something came flying inside, hitting the floor and rolling.
It was a bottle.
The bottle was filled with oil, and a rag had been stuffed in its mouth.
The rag was on fire.
A second burning bottle followed, but this one shattered and oil spread across the floor, creating a long, running flame.
“Céline!” Amelie cried, jumping to her feet and grabbing her cloak off a peg, trying to put out the fire.
Céline cast about in panic, looking for anything she might grab to help her sister, but her own cloak and their blankets were all upstairs. No matter how hard Amelie beat at them, the flames kept spreading, and then a third bottle came flying through the window. This one smashed into a set of shelves and set the wall on fire.
“We have to get out!” Céline called over the growing roar. “Run for the back.”
Amelie was not one to quit at anything, but the entire room was nearly engulfed, and smoke was filling the air; only a second after Céline’s shout, they both bolted for the back door. Amelie stopped long enough to grab her sword. She almost never took off the dagger, so it was still on her hip.
Céline flew out into the night first, running through her beloved herb garden, jumping over the tall lavender and the catnip, with Amelie right on her heels. But even amidst the panic, amidst fleeing for her life, Céline could not help the horror washing through her that their shop, their home, was burning, and it was her fault.
Worse, she couldn’t stop remembering the sight of the long sword crashing through their shutter, and she had a terrible feeling this wasn’t over yet. She stopped for a second to make certain Amelie was right behind her.
“Out the back gate and into the trees,” Amelie said as quietly as she could and still be heard over the flames. Clearly, she was afraid the worst might yet be to come as well.
Céline ran for all she was worth, flying over more of her herbs and clutching at the handle of the back gate, pulling it open. With the roar of the fire behind her, she could think only of reaching the safety of the trees—and someplace to hide.
But she’d barely passed through when a strong hand grabbed her hair and she was jerked hard until her back was pressed up against someone’s chest; he held the point of a knife to her throat.
“Amelie!” she screamed.
She couldn’t see her captor, but she could feel his chain armor through her shoulder blades, and in the moonlight, she could clearly see two men in black tabards in front of her. One of them rushed through the gate, and then she heard Amelie’s angry cry, followed by the clank of steel.
The other soldier didn’t move for a few seconds. But when he turned to look at her, her heart nearly stopped. She could see the protruding belly and greasy hair of Captain Kochè. In the darkness, his eyes glowed as they moved slowly from her hips all the way up to her face.
“Don’t kill that one yet,” he told the guard holding her. “I want some time with her first.”
She went cold and sick to her stomach at the same time, and over the roar of the fire, she could still hear the clanking of steel coming from the garden. Amelie was better when she had the element of surprise, and Céline didn’t know how long she’d last in a stand-up fight against a trained soldier.
Céline cursed herself. What a fool she’d been.
But then, just for an instant, Kochè took his eyes off her and turned his head back toward the sound of the fight in the garden, perhaps wondering if he should go help his man end this quickly.
A loud thud sounded in Céline’s ears, and she was freed so fast she stumbled forward. A flash of tan blurred past her, and as Kochè whirled to look back, a soldier in a tan tabard swung a club and caught him across the jaw.
Kochè, caught completely unaware, hit the ground like a sack of grain.
Céline glanced backward to see that the man in the black tabard who’d been holding her was now unconscious on the ground, and another soldier in a tan tabard stood there gripping a club. Panting and anxious, he was tall, with cropped dark hair.
But the man who’d clubbed down Kochè looked into the garden and then back at Céline. His sword was still in its sheath. “Where’s the seer?” he demanded. “Is she still in that shop?” He had a muscular build and a goatee and wore his long hair tied at the nape of his neck.
Céline wondered if she could even speak, but she somehow got out, “I’m the seer.”
He stared at her with a flicker of surprise, and then he ordered. “Pavel, get her on a horse! I’ll get the other one.”
“Sir, don’t kill any of Damek’s men,” Pavel said back. “Or there’ll be hell to pay.”
“Go!”
Before Céline had time for a new wave of panic, her feet left the ground, and she found herself being heaved over Pavel’s shoulder.
* * *
In Jaromir’s mind, he’d pictured the seer as an old crone with a crystal ball, not a lovely young woman in a red velvet dress, and he was still trying to get his head around this as he ran through the back gate and almost raised a hand to his face to ward off the heat from the blazing apothecary shop.
But then the sight before him stopped him in his tracks.
The black-haired girl he’d seen coming out of the shop that afternoon was engaged in a desperate fight with one of Captain Kochè’s men. Both of them were swinging hard, but most of the time, the girl was managing to duck instead of block, and her speed was astonishing. She had a short sword in one hand and a dagger in the other. But as her opponent was much larger and using a long sword, she couldn’t seem to land a slash or a blow, and Jaromir was experienced enough to see she was getting tired.
As yet, they were both so absorbed, neither one had noticed him.
Quickly, he moved forward, and when the soldier finished a downswing—missing the girl—Jaromir swung hard with the club, striking the back of his head from behind. Unfortunately, he didn’t go down right away, and the girl rushed in, ramming her dagger into an unarmored spot at the base of his throat. Blood squirted into the air.
“No!” Jaromir cried, too late. “Don’t.”
She jerked her dagger out, and the soldier fell, probably dead before he hit the ground.
Lost in rage and panic, the girl looked around wildly. “Céline!”
Her eyes stopped on Jaromir, and she rushed, swinging her short sword, which he managed to block with his club. “Stop it! I’m trying to help you.”
She didn’t even seem to hear him, and everything was happening almost too fast for him to keep up. She started to swing again, but he dodged to the inside, dropped his club, grabbed her wrist, and swung with his fist, catching her across the jaw. As the crack sounded, she collapsed against his arm, and he cursed under his breath.
He hadn’t wanted to do that.
Worse, there was a dead soldier in a black tabard lying in the parsley patch.
But he could hear the voices of people from the village shouting out front now as they ran toward the burning shop. Crouching, he slid the girl’s sword and dagger back into their sheaths. Then he threw her over his shoulder and rushed for the gate.
Once outside, behind him, all he could hear was the growing roar of the fire.
* * *
Céline was so numb she didn’t even feel the cold. She was on a horse, sitting in front of the soldier called Pavel, while he held her tightly with one arm and held the reins in his other hand, pushing hard through the wet forest.
She could hear another horse moving behind them in the darkness, but as yet she’d not seen Amelie and had no idea what was happening. She only knew she’d brought the threat of death raining down on them…and that their home was gone.
More from instinct than hope, she’d struggled in Pavel’s arm a few times, but he hadn’t seemed to notice and just kept pushing his horse.
“All right,” a deep voice called from behind. “That’s far enough.”
Pavel pulled up and turned his horse, looking back. “You sure, sir?”
“Yes, for a few minutes at least.”
Céline wanted to weep in relief at the sight behind them. The soldier with the goatee was holding Amelie in front of himself on his own horse. She was unconscious but breathing and did not appear to be bleeding from any wounds. Then Céline saw that her hands were bound together by a small rope, and her eyes flew up to the soldier’s face.
“A precaution I thought best,” he said dryly. “For the rest of this night, you’re both going to have to behave and do exactly what I tell you.”
Still numb, Céline just stared at him. She had no idea who he was or what he wanted. She only knew that he’d tied Amelie’s hands and that she was being held against her will on top of a stranger’s horse…and that their home was gone.
The soldier’s expression softened, almost to pity. “My name is Lieutenant Jaromir,” he said, “and I swear I’m trying to help you.”
Finding her voice, Céline whispered, “Why would you help us?”
“Because my lord ordered me to.”
“And who is your lord?” she managed to ask, more confused than before.
“Sub-Prince Anton of the House of Pählen, Damek’s younger brother.”