“That is not a name heard in Dire. Is it Kondor?”
He nodded.
She moved her horse another step closer, so their knees nearly touched. Her voice dropped in volume, almost to a whisper, “That is the third time you have not answered me out loud. I consider that evasive and rude. It is cause for me to kill you here and now.”
“I-I’ll talk.”
She indicated the two purses. “Is that all you have left of my money?”
He nodded—then quickly corrected himself and said, “Yes.”
“Then you are fools. Most of that was stolen from us. You sold our valuables for nothing and paid for this food with the proceeds?”
“Yes.”
It was her turn to shake her head. She waved a hand at me, “Damon’s sword was worth these two bags of money, and more. You sold our valuable belongings for pennies.” She poured silver coins from a purse to her other hand in disgust. She then repeated it with the other purse, estimating what was there with a sad shake of her head.
“We also purchased blankets and food,” he added as if that explained the small purses.
She held up a single small coin. “All you have is worth less than this. Where is our gold?”
“Gold?” he seemed completely surprised.
I reminded her, “If we hurry we will reach the campsite before dark.”
She hesitated her eyes cold pits of anger that had both prisoners reeling. “We will discuss this later. For now, understand me. You tell your friend that if either of you attempts to escape, I will put another arrow in both of you, probably in the center of your back. Tell him.”
The man who called himself Stata spoke to the other in a guttural language and received a quick nod in response. It didn’t appear either of them would try anything because they were too scared. I said, “You two take the lead. If one of you rides off, I’ll kill the other before I come after you.”
“We,” Elizabeth corrected me. “We will come after you together, but it is me who will kill them.”
Just so they understood, I turned to Elizabeth. “You are a princess, so it must be me who will do the killing.”
“As a princess, so I demand the right. End of subject.”
After hearing and translating that, I believed that if either of their horses bolted, they would throw themselves off to the hard ground rather than have us chase after them. My hand motioned for them again to lead, and they turned their horses up the path. Of course, the horses were not theirs, they belonged to our king, and therefore to Elizabeth, but I let it go. Her choice to continue on the other horse did surprise me, but she was in a hurry to get back and check on Tater.
Riding up the trail was harder, but the distance not great. We arrived with daylight to spare. I helped each of them dismount and supported them as they limped to the edge of the fire. Kendra had a pile of firewood as tall as herself and the night chill was settling upon the mountains.
Tater sat with his back to a small tree, awake and alert. Across the fire sat one wounded man where there should be two. Tater saw my surprise and said, “He’s the only one left, and he’s not doing so well.”
Of the original three, one had a chest wound, and we had expected him to die. Of the remaining pair, one had an arrow in his leg, the other in his arm near his shoulder. I suspected treachery. “What happened?”
He shrugged, “One died right away. The arrow in the leg sprang a leak in the night. We didn’t notice. Both were dead at first light.”
I looked at Kendra. “Tater?”
“His biggest problem according to him is that they took his chew.”
“What?”
“That bark he chews, his chew. One of them took it. Between that and Springer being missing, it’s all I can do to keep him from going on a rampage, broken arm or no.”
I’d settled both of those we’d returned with back on a log, then pointed to arrows still in their legs. “We need to help them.”
Tater scooted closer to them. “Where’s my chew?”
To my surprise and relief, Stata spoke right up, as he pointed, “Hanging on the tree. We opened it, and it smelled so bad we put it there to keep bears away.”
Kendra flinched. “There have been bears down the hillside where we put the others. Lots of growling and wolves are there too. I won’t go see what they’ve done.”
Tater was still fixated on Stata. “My dog?”
“We sold the dog,” Stata said without hesitation, but only after a slight pause as if trying to find the right words, as those speaking a second language often do. “We’re hungry and have no food. None wanted to eat the ugly dog for fear of catching an illness.”
“Sold it to who?” Tater said, sounding out each syllable as if they were individual threats while he ignored the mention of eating Springer.
“The man at the store. He said he’d give it a good home because nobody would ever buy such an ugly dog from him.”
Kendra had sat beside Stata and was carefully examining the arrow shaft in his leg. At his remarks about Springer, she grasped the shaft with both hands and yanked it out, tearing flesh in the process, and blood filled the wound and flowed. She ignored the wail of pain and tossed him a rag as she said, “Hold that over it until it stops. If it does.”
If anyone has ever had any doubt about the difference in men and women, they should have watched her. A man will fight another, usually on reasonably equal terms. A woman is a savage. She moved to the other, who scooted away from her as fast as she moved forward. “If I have to come get you, I promise you some real pain. Hold still.”
He may not have understood our language, but he also understood Kendra’s body language and tone. She walked to him and grasped the arrow in one hand and tugged gently. It moved. She turned it slightly to better line the shaft with the hole and eased it out, to the accompaniment of his reluctant screaming, but in the end, he smiled his thanks. He’d known she had removed it as painlessly as possible, but without anything to deaden the pain or mind. No blood flowed from the wound.
Tater said, “They better hope Springer is still there or they’ll learn what real pain is from me.”
I went to the tree and handed Tater his bag of shredded bark and stood back. Kendra told me he shouldn’t have it because of his injuries, but I was not going to fight Tater, even in his condition, and the look he flashed my way warned me that was what would be required to take it away.
Elizabeth had been scurrying around the campsite gathering our things together. They were spread all over. It seemed many of the attackers divided our belongings by some unknown manner. She had our five horses staked in the grass near the stream, the saddles and packs near the firepit, and the contents of all spread on blankets.
She came to stand beside Kendra and peered at the one we could speak with. “Ask your friends where my gold is.”
He called out in their language. The shoulder-wounded man responded, and the first turned to Elizabeth. “He thinks one of them buried it.”
“Where?”
“He does not know. But he says he saw it. I didn’t.”
She allowed her eyes to scan the ground, and how us and them, had trampled everything. I suspected the one who hid it had smoothed the ground to keep it hidden from the others, so unless we decided to dig up the whole camp where a dozen men had lived, the gold was gone. Besides, it was now full dark and even searching would be difficult.
Kendra was applying a salve to the legs of the two men she had treated, and when I turned her way, she held her fingers in the signal we needed to speak. I gave her a small nod of assent. She said, “The one that talks didn’t bleed.”