The Alliance (10 page)

Helene was startled. Few men deferred to a woman and no High Born would consider asking advice from one. Kamran was calmly turning her world upside down. She’d gone to sleep last night in fear of her life and woke this morning a trusted accomplice, her advice sought and taken. Kamran wouldn’t have taken the risk of a potential enemy in his ranks lightly. He was too competent a tactician, and he’d proved himself immune to her charms.

“Where are we going?”

“Kordobah.”

Last night, she’d gambled desperately to stay alive. This morning she could view her machinations with the contempt they deserved. Only her analysis of his potential as a conqueror remained.

“You spoke of a serious skirmish. Who will we fight?”

He noted the
we
. She could see it in his eyes.

“With luck, no one.” He held up his hand to forestall further questions. “We march to Kordobah because I have the names of those who supplied them and grew rich from their crimes. What happens there will depend on the reaction of the High Born.”

Helene nodded. The smugglers existed because each principality imposed taxes on trade. For many of them, it was their only source of wealth because their land had degraded to little better than subsistence farming. Her family was a rarity. They’d improved their land, generation after generation, because no trade routes passed their borders and it, and their peasants, were their only wealth.

She stopped.

Kamran knew her name. Therefore, he knew her family history. This was no ignorant soldier. He might not know of her personally, but the attitude of her family to the peasants they controlled would have earned his approval—she hoped. It might explain her survival if he was giving her the chance to prove herself.

He watched her, eyes more gray than blue, a barometer of his thoughts she was learning to trust.

“When do we march? I need to prepare.” She accepted it was time for business.

“In an hour, the women have food ready. We march when all have eaten.” He smiled, turning his eyes bluer.

Helene could see the twenty men Beyorn commanded wolfing down food at the trestle table. They must be Kamran’s advance guard. She turned back to the young woman she’d selected to accompany her and started explaining, aware he’d walked away and happy to have a task she understood rather than her endless guessing as to his motives.

“Will we sleep with the archers too?” The girl’s question caught her by surprise.

“I don’t know,” she answered honestly. “I hadn’t thought about it.”

“I’ve taken a spearman with the lead company. He’s a man-at-arms and can protect me.”

“Do you need protection?” Helene had been busy since her release from the smugglers.

“No. It’s our choice now.” Casual rape had been a feature of smuggler captivity, even on the march. “He won’t allow otherwise, but most of us feel better with one man. You know, you have him.”

Helene was about to shake her head, when she thought better and stilled the movement. Given the opportunity, she would choose Kamran. Was she reacting like the others and seeking safety in his arms? She’d endured the smugglers, forcing herself to cooperate whenever they took her, focusing on survival even when the future seemed bleakest. Even when she’d recognized Kamran’s livery and his connection to Fleur d’Gracay, she’d acted deliberately to gain his sympathy. He wasn’t Fleur’s type and her cousin cared little for the opinions of others, especially those tasked with enforcing the peace.

She knew him better now. His strength would have repelled Fleur, and she was glad. For reasons she didn’t care to examine, the thought of them together was disturbing.

She was waiting when the trumpeter sounded Assembly and took her place with the archers, who competed good-naturedly when their sergeant appointed two of them to each woman. “He wants them with us,” the sergeant said. “Make sure they are at the end of the day. Any fighting and it’s your job to protect them.”

Their formation was three abreast with Helene and her assistant in the middle file. The men on either side shared their burdens, a fact earning their gratitude before the first hour of the march ended. Kamran’s men marched at one hundred and fifty paces per minute, for ten minutes, with breaks of five, at a leisurely one hundred and thirty paces per minute. Noise discipline was rigid. All orders were by hand signals, repeated along the line, and his army flowed along the forest trail like a torrent, frequently changed scouts ranging ahead and to either side. They rested for ten minutes every two hours. Kamran prowled the length of the line, speaking to sergeants and individuals, Helene and her assistant included, giving encouragement and advice, setting an example.

She asked him about his leg and he shrugged. It was an irrelevance.

On the third break of the day, Beyorn and his twenty men caught up with them, all of them carrying bulging leather sacks as well as their usual equipment. No one had the breath to comment as they filed past on either side and took their place at the head of the march.

They left the trail with the last of the light, moving single file into a secluded clearing and making camp with silent efficiency. There only a few fires, each hidden in a deep pit, but every man received a full beaker of rich steaming soup, thick enough to be called stew.

Helene’s assistant disappeared with her spearman and left her squatting by the fire, allowing the heat to soothe her aching muscles.

“Come,” Kamran said. “Join me. It is my turn.”

Mystified, she followed him to the edge of the forest and a nook formed beneath an ancient tree. His cloak covered a bed of cut grass from the clearing.

“Strip and lay down on your belly. You made it through today, but you’ll need help to do the same tomorrow.”

Helene obeyed and Kamran massaged aching muscles until they relaxed and lost their tension, beginning at her feet and working his way up to her neck. It felt delicious and hardly noticed when he turned her over and began on her thighs.

“Your assistant’s spearman will do the same for her,” he said, and Helene wasn’t surprised. It seemed natural he should know. A blanket covered her when he finished, helping her naked body retain the warmth of his hands, but she was barely aware of it, sleep only a blink away.

She stirred when he joined her much later, rolling sleepily toward the warmth of his body, arms going around the muscled column of his torso. He shifted to accommodate her and Helene drifted back into sleep.

Waking alone in the predawn bustle of the camp stirring, Helen dressed hurriedly and went searching for Kamran. His wound needed checking. She found him addressing a group of his sergeants and corporals. She waited until he finished.

“Your wound,” she said, pointing at the bandage with its dark patch of blood. “It should be checked and redressed.”

He looked down at it, as if surprised at the reminder of its existence. “Do it at the first break. I’ll come back to you.” He turned away as a corporal returned with a question, and Helene had to be satisfied.

The march began with the trickle of light through the treetops and Helene’s residual stiffness lasted only the first few minutes. Her world shrank to the half-seen figures on either side of her or the back of the man in front, her pace regulated by them, and their harsh breathing the only sound.

The first break came as a surprise and she’d forgotten her appointment to dress his wound until Kamran stood in front of her and she had to retrieve her burdens from the men who’d carried them. “Sit down,” she told him. “Leg out in front of you, wound up most.”

A trickle of water softened the caked blood and the silk bandage came away to reveal the puckered lips of the stitched gash. The edges of skin were pale and dead, but the flesh was cool to touch. She’d been right. He was a good healer. She wrapped it tightly with fresh bandages and stowed the soiled one in her pack. She’d wash it later.

“Thank you,” he said, standing to test the bandage and nodding his satisfaction. “You’ve done a good job.” He raised his hand in a signal and the break ended.

They stopped early that night.

“The road into Kordobah is just over the rise,” the archer at her right explained. “We’ll enter the town as their guards change for breakfast. It will add to the confusion.”

Their campsite had a small stream and Helene hurried upstream, both to bathe and to wash the bandage. The flow was great enough for it to present no problem to the camp water supply.

When she returned, Kamran was waiting. “Don’t go off on your own again. Take your assistant at least.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, aware it was concern for her safety from his choice of her companion. “I’ll be more careful in the future.”

“From tomorrow, the risks escalate.” He looked serious. “You must not move without your two archers. Only when you are with me will you be safe. The same goes for your assistant. Except when she is with her spearman, she must have the protection of the men assigned to her.”

“I’ll make sure she understands.”

They ate together, the camp quiet around them in the deepening dusk. They were close to the trail and to the road.

“Do I get a massage tonight?” She smiled.

“Do you need one?” He too smiled.

“I always need a massage.”

His smile deepened. “I don’t suppose I’d find anyone else to do it at this short notice.”

“Not if you value their lives,” she agreed.

“A wise commander avoids casualties.” He stood up. “Our bed is in that direction. I’ll brief the guard commander and join you.”

He took his time but Helene forgave him when she realized he’d bathed too. His hair was still damp, as was the bandage on his leg, and his chain mail shirt lay over his arm.

Her massage came first, but this time its effect was different. Her skin tingled to his touch and her excitement escalated to a point where self control was a distant memory, entirely unrelated to anything Helene might feel. He provided guidance not control, firm hands stilling her movements. He was giving her the choice. Helene moaned her consent, words beyond her.

“Wait,” he whispered. “It will be worth it.”

She didn’t disbelieve him but her body had a mind of its own, and she was captive to its demands, rather than his. His patience was inexhaustible, his self control absolute, as he coaxed responses from her she’d thought soiled forever by the smugglers.

She’d healed his leg and he was intent on healing her soul. He’d done this before—or had learned by failure.

It was odd. A part of her mind could think, could observe and reason, while the rest was so intimately involved in an irresistible arousal, it prompted her to scream her demands to the sky.

“Shush, baby.” He turned her over and covered her mouth with his, swallowing her moans as his hands shifted from massage to exploration, gently kneading her flesh into ecstasy as he discovered secret places to pleasure her—sensitive spots known only to her, before moving lower, his calloused fingers caressing so softly her skin quivered in response. Helen writhed in ecstasy when he found her bud, his touch incredibly sure for a man. He’d done this many times before.

She panted softly, her breath puffing into his mouth without breaking the contact of their lips. She had never been one for kisses, considering the pastime vastly over-rated as anything but a form of greeting relatives. She learned her mistake as his tongue teased and delighted her at the same time.

Her nipples, the gently aching cores of her breasts, demanded his touch and the center of her being had shifted south to a yawning chasm that throbbed its need. Yet, he would not hurry, prolonging each moment until her arousal became eerily selfish. Nothing mattered but her, and the world receded to leave only the means of her satisfaction, not as part of him, but individual items with entirely separate entities. She reached for what she wanted and guided it home with no sensation that the flesh impaling her had an owner. It acted to her desire, not his, and she exploded time and time again around it until exhaustion claimed her and she spiraled down into the darkness.

* * * *

Rachael felt impatient. They’d reached the shore at first light. She’d set up her signal on the broad beach and expected rescue at dusk. Now past midnight, she felt hungry, tired, and longing for the comfort and security of the mother ship. Too many strange things had happened on this planet.

A new phantom had invaded her mind, a woman called Helene. She shared flashes of her experiences in her dreams, felt her fear of the sergeant, and the growth of another emotion she couldn’t yet define. Her tiredness made her more vulnerable it seemed.

“Your friends aren’t coming tonight.” Anneke sounded definite. “I’m going to see what food I can scrounge in the village.”

Rachael nodded distractedly. “I’d better stay here, just in case. Be careful.” Their beach lay between two fishing villages, the closest one just beyond the point.

“Bet on it.” Anneke’s teeth showed whitely in the gloom.

Rachael wished she could match her friend’s robust cheerfulness. Nothing fazed Anneke. She was as impervious to tiredness as she was to fear and despair. A friend first and foremost, her connection to the Alliance an irrelevance, Anneke had opened Rachael’s eyes to the world outside the Federation, and she would never be the same again. “I’ll keep watch until you return.”