Just outside a small gate was a sturdy horse with an old leather satchel tied to the saddle. My heart lurched into my throat.
“I need a carriage. I don’t ride on the backs of animals”—I caught Simon’s eye—“or with animals.”
He peeled off his guard’s uniform, revealing civilian clothes with tears in the fabric and frayed seams. If he had
two coins to his name, I’d be shocked.
He faced me once more. “Kes, we’re alone now. Do you know who I am?”
“I know that you’re a fool to have done this.”
“I’m sure you’re right,” he said, his voice as cold as the night air. “Now get on the horse or I’ll drag you behind it.”
“You’re no protector.” I reached for the horse’s reins. “Not if you speak to me as an enemy.”
He clicked his tongue, irritated. “My lady, right now, I am the only friend you’ve got.” With that, he swung into the saddle behind me, wrapped his filthy arms on either side of me, and rode us into the dark night.
Rode me away from the only home I’d ever known, into an outside world I barely knew. Whatever this boy’s intentions, wherever we were going, I’d never been so terrified in my life.
Fifteen minutes had passed since we left Woodcourt, and my mind was still trying to sort out what had happened.
Basil had referenced that I was early for the plan. Was that the same plan Trina and Gabe had tried to tell me about? Were they working together now? How was such a thing possible?
More concerning still was that Kestra did not seem to know me. This was obviously the work of Lord Endrick, though I didn’t yet know the extent of the damage he’d caused within her mind, her memories. I only knew that he’d separated me from anything she did remember and taken with it emotions that I thought had run as deeply within her as they did me.
Erasing them.
Erasing me.
The way she’d kissed Basil back there, or allowed him to kiss her, had ripped me up. And I wasn’t sure how long I was supposed to pretend that I was only her indifferent protector, a nameless part of some Corack plan. I didn’t even know how to pretend such a thing, not when every instinct within me was to close my arms around her and tell her how I truly felt. Whatever Endrick had done to her mind, he had done far worse to my heart.
“Can you loosen your arm around my waist?” Kestra asked. “I’d like to breathe.”
“If you can speak, you can breathe.”
She scoffed, then asked, “Your name is Simon?”
“Simon Hatch. We’ve met before.”
We’d met before. We’d fought before. We’d embraced each other, shared moments together where there was no one in the world but us. I remembered every detail of every kiss, every brush of her hand over mine, the softness of her cheek against my palm.
And yet she looked at me as if I were a stranger. Or worse, as if I were an enemy.
Slowing the horse to a canter, I said, “I need you to raise the skirt on your right thigh.”
She twisted around, eyes blazing. “I will not!”
“Do it, or I’ll search you. I know exactly how you’d feel about that, so I suggest you do as I ask.”
She huffed, then raised the skirt, very briefly, but enough for me to verify there was no garter, no weapon. Then, without me having to ask, she did the same for her left thigh, with the same results. I wished I had found a knife on her. It would have been some glimmer of the Kestra I’d known, the one always ready for a fight. But it also brought up another question of far greater significance.
Where was the Olden Blade?
“If it’s a ransom you want, my father will pay what you ask,” she said, cutting into my thoughts.
“I don’t want a ransom.” Yet I did note that these words were almost the very opposite of what she had told me the last time we were in this situation.
“Then you must think you’re saving me from something,” she continued. “What is it?” When I didn’t answer, she added, “Maybe from the luxuries of being a Dallisor? Or the protection that comes from serving Lord Endrick? Maybe a lifetime of happiness with Basil? Is that what you’re saving me from, Simon?”