Chapter 108

Odelliana barely had time to react when one of the barbarians strode forward at a curt command to check her. The man yanked open her robe without ceremony, exposing the pale woman beneath, silver hair spilling over her shoulders and blue eyes flashing with defiance. The leader of the search party narrowed his eyes as his gaze dropped to the splinted leg revealed beneath her skirt. Recognition dawned instantly.

“This is the one,” the leader declared coldly. “Take her.”

Two pursuers hauled Odelliana upright, and in that precise instant she struck. With a swift, practiced motion, she drove the dagger hidden against her body straight into one man’s neck. He choked out a strangled scream and collapsed. As the second soldier lashed out to kick her, Odelliana flung a fistful of dirt into his eyes with all her strength. Blinded, he staggered, and Malena surged up behind him, smashing a rock against his skull with a sickening crack.

Malena did not hesitate. She wrenched a machete from the fallen man’s grip and swung it at the remaining attackers with the clean efficiency of a seasoned mercenary. Her muscular frame lent power to every strike, and her movements were stripped of waste. Within moments, the last two men crumpled to the ground.

Spattered with blood, Odelliana wiped her face and pushed herself unsteadily to her feet. “You are impressive, Malena,” she praised hoarsely.

Malena shot her an incredulous glare as she rifled through the corpses for supplies. “You nearly gave me a heart attack,” she scolded breathlessly. “How could you rush out like that without a word? You should have warned me.”

“I trusted you to handle it,” Odelliana replied simply.

Malena huffed in frustration. “You are impossibly reckless,” she muttered, even as she gathered emergency rations, water, and weapons. Then she gripped Odelliana’s arm. “We need to hide. Now.”

Supporting her, Malena guided Odelliana to higher ground and slipped with her into a shallow dugout they had prepared in advance. It was hardly deep enough to deserve the name of a cave, but it concealed two women well enough.

“Stay here and do not move until reinforcements arrive,” Malena instructed firmly.

“And you?” Odelliana asked quietly.

“I will keep watch outside,” Malena answered. “I will circle to the other side, climb a tree, and lure any approaching enemies away. If their attention is on me, they will not search here.”

She was volunteering to become a decoy. If Odelliana’s body had not been compromised, she would have insisted on fighting beside her, but now remaining hidden was the only sensible choice.

“Do not die,” Odelliana said softly.

Malena smiled with fierce reassurance. “Do not worry,” she replied, and slipped away.

Alone in the cramped hollow, Odelliana curled into the corner and forced herself to breathe in silence. She strained her ears toward the chaos outside. Piercing screams and shouted orders mingled in the air. Even hidden, she could not stop imagining how many people were being slaughtered or dragged away in chains. The thought made her vision swim.

War, she realized with a cold clarity, was far more terrifying from the side of the powerless civilian than from that of a soldier on the front lines. Helplessness settled over her like a weight.

She did not know how much time passed before hurried footsteps approached, far too many to count at a glance. They prowled nearby as if combing the area. Her shoulders tensed. Suddenly the leaves concealing the entrance were ripped aside, and a brutal hand seized her collar and hauled her out.

“There you are, little rat,” a man sneered.

Odelliana looked up and felt her blood run cold. The face looming over her was unmistakable. Lycan Droif, the barbarian supreme commander who in her previous life had fallen to Matthias’s blade, stood before her in the flesh. The deep scar slashing from his right eye to his cheek, the dark bronze skin, the long gray hair, and the massive frame were exactly as she remembered. A chill raced down her spine, not from fear for herself but from dread for Malena. Worse still, his presence here meant their intelligence had failed catastrophically.

He tilted her chin up and studied her with open appraisal. “She is quite pretty,” he remarked lazily. “Are you certain this is the woman?”

“Yes,” a subordinate confirmed eagerly. “She is the strategist serving beside the prince and the lord. Some say she is a distant relative of the lord. Others claim she married him. In any case, she acts as the lady of this place, and there are even rumors she is the prince’s lover.”

Lycan gave a low chuckle as he inspected her face. “The prince’s mistress, is she? The title suits her looks,” he said with a smirk. His gaze roamed over her with thinly veiled lust. “Her eyes are different from an ordinary woman’s. Hard to believe that little head devised the battles that cost my men their lives.”

“What shall we do with her?” the subordinate asked.

Lycan considered. “She has many uses,” he mused. “It is almost troublesome to decide.”

“Should we cripple her other leg so she cannot escape?” the man suggested.

Lycan laughed softly. “Do you have no pity for a lame woman? If she cannot use either leg, how is she meant to live?” His tone was mockingly gentle, but his eyes glittered with base desire as they lingered on her exposed leg.

When Odelliana suddenly tried to swallow a pellet of crushed poison herbs, the subordinate cried out in alarm. Lycan’s hand shot forward. He forced her mouth open and thrust his fingers inside, dragging the half swallowed poison back out.

“Not so fast,” he murmured darkly. “It would be a shame for you to die before I have had my fun.”

“Let go,” Odelliana spat, struggling violently, but he overpowered her with a single arm. Another man produced a gag. Lycan jammed it into her mouth. Saliva spilled down her chin, and he caught it on his palm with a crude grin before licking it away. Then he hoisted her over his shoulder.

“Our objective is achieved,” he announced. “We are leaving.”

By the time the Eisenwald troops arrived at the ravaged refugee camp, it was too late. Jocelyn dismounted and searched frantically, his voice sharp with urgency. “Find a small woman with silver hair and blue eyes,” he ordered. The fate of the other civilians did not concern him. When he learned the barbarians had specifically targeted Odelliana and heard that she had fled into the forest, he spurred his horse into the mountains, shouting her name as he rode past freed captives, butchered corpses, and pools of blood.

He finally spotted a familiar figure: a broad shouldered, bronze skinned blonde woman. He leaped from his horse and seized her attention. “Where is Odelliana?” he demanded.

Malena was grievously wounded, her limbs twisted and broken, bone jutting through flesh, yet Jocelyn barely registered her injuries. Gasping for breath, she forced out an answer. “The commander,” she rasped. “It was the supreme commander. He found her in the dugout. I tried to stop him, but he struck me once and I lost consciousness.”

Lycan Droif had been reported waiting near the Razagal Forest. His appearance here meant they had been deceived. Rage flared in Jocelyn’s chest. As medics carried Malena away on a stretcher, she clutched his hand with desperate strength.

“Please,” she begged faintly. “Save my lady.”

Jocelyn clenched his teeth. Once he might have dismissed the loss of a crippled woman as insignificant, but now Odelliana von Grüsewald was a woman of immense value to him, a potential queen he refused to relinquish. He mounted his horse and returned at once to the main force.

“The barbarian supreme commander Lycan Droif has taken the lord’s sister hostage,” he announced grimly. “We will convene an emergency council to plan a rescue operation.”

***

Captives were rarely treated kindly, and Odelliana expected brutality. Instead she was scrubbed by barbarian attendants, forced into thin clothing, gagged again, and thrown onto a bed inside a tent. Even as she recognized what fate likely awaited her, her eyes scanned the interior for anything she could use as a weapon. If an opportunity came, she would kill him or die trying. Being used as leverage against Blair was a fate she would not accept.

She pressed her face into her knees. She did not fear death, but regret tugged at her. She thought of the true owner of this body, of Malena, of Blair, and most of all of Matthias. She had promised she would remain safe, and once again she seemed destined to break that promise.

As longing for him tightened her chest, the tent flap opened. Lycan entered in relaxed attire, a satisfied smile curving his lips as he approached the bed.

“What a sight,” he drawled, openly admiring the way the gagged prisoner curled in the corner. Her fierce glare only stoked his excitement. He laughed when he guessed her intentions. “If I remove the gag, you might try to bite out my throat,” he teased. “I have no desire to die like that.”

His rough hands roamed over her, and she twisted in furious resistance, striking his chest to no effect. He tore away her clothing with brutal impatience. Odelliana squeezed her eyes shut, fury and disgust churning inside her as he forced her into position.

Then, without warning, a wet choking sound split the air. Blood rained down. Lycan’s massive body collapsed to the floor. Odelliana stared in shock at the severed neck and the spreading crimson beneath him. A presence loomed behind her. She spun around.

In the dim lamplight stood a man whose features were sharper and more defined than she remembered, golden eyes gleaming coldly above a hardened jaw. He looked at her, and recognition crashed over her like a wave.

“Master,” Matthias said quietly.