Warrior's Touch (Deadly Touch book 2)
Where Will You Go?

Merrid’s enthusiastic greeting brought a smile to Jonas’s lips and a little warmth to his heart. They were in deepest Turhmos, danger coming at them from all directions, and in the middle of it all was this couple. He didn’t understand how, in the midst of such a hateful nation as Turhmos, there could be folk like this; folk so loving they looked right past all their differences and simply saw folk. Ard was still wary, that was clear. He couldn’t blame the farmer. Jonas had been rude the last time. Not that he hadn’t been grateful for their hospitality, but his mind had been elsewhere, with Llew still missing at the time. Yet, despite that, the farmers were inviting him into their home again.

Merrid released Llew and beckoned them all in, but Llew remained in the doorway.

“Oh, don’t cry,” Merrid pleaded. “You’ll get me started.”

Jonas stepped up behind Llew and, with a hand to her lower back, guided her deeper into the kitchen so the rest of them could fit in behind her. Jonas pulled Llew into his side, an arm across her shoulders as the others entered, filling the kitchen to full. Ard’s appraisal wasn’t accusing, but it still made Jonas feel as if he’d done something wrong and he removed his arm, nearly laughing out loud to think the farmer could have such an effect on him.

Merrid had Hisham lift down another saucepan.

“We will need some more bacon,” Merrid said pointedly to her husband.

Ard jumped to comply, giving Jonas a look as he opened the door, and Jonas moved as swiftly to follow. Ard led the way to a cool store. A pig’s carcass hung inside, salted and smoked.

“Might as well put you to use.” Ard snaffled up an old, large – and still plenty sharp despite its tarnish – knife and handed it to Jonas. The farmer scooped a fistful of muslin off a bench and bent to spread it over the rim of a wide bowl, which he scooted under the pig, and Jonas stepped in to start slicing. He worked methodically, slowly. His palms were still raw, but not so bad as to prevent him carrying out such a basic task.

“You tread carefully with my Llew, y’hear,” Ard began as soon as Jonas was engaged in his work, apparently not intimidated one bit about being in close proximity to a fully trained Syakaran soldier holding a sharp knife. “She has it in her mind that you need her in your fight against this Immortal, and she needs you to protect her.”

Jonas focused on his slicing, working at normal speed. Something told him Ard had a lot to say and he wasn’t about to stand around with nothing to do while the farmer tore strips off him the way Aris used to. He’d continue to do as much to the pig, even if it meant exposing bone.

“Need ain’t love, nor respect.”

“I respect her.” Jonas couldn’t help himself, even though he felt he was being baited.

“Do you?”

Jonas paused long enough to give Ard a flat look. The farmer was pushing his luck. Didn’t he know who he was talking to?

“You’re Syakaran.” Evidently, he did. “It would be easy to think that a Syakaran and a Syaenuk would make a good match. A powerful match. Maybe even a dutiful one,” Ard continued. “And it would be easy for a man used to getting his way to use his power to convince a young girl she wants that, too.”

“It ain’t about duty,” Jonas almost snarled, Aris’s demands for duty still fresh. “And I ain’t tried to convince her of nothin’. Whatever Llew thinks she wants, she’s come to it on her own.”

“I ain’t tryin’ to say you ain’t a good man,” Ard surprised Jonas by saying. “I haven’t been averse to readin’ a few of your tales that’ve found their way this side of the border. You’ve played the role of dutiful soldier well. Shame it got in the way of bein’ a good husband.”

Jonas’s teeth clenched and his knuckles whitened around the knife handle. Ard was walking a thin line. He’d done as Aris told him. The young Jonas thought it a fine idea. Kierra was beautiful. What more could a young man desire? It was only after they wed that Jonas realized he also wanted a happy wife and that Aris’s requests conflicted with that. He’d had much to learn about women. For some reason, simply being married to the Syakaran hero of Quaver hadn’t been enough for Kierra. He had more understanding why, now.

“You think you can do right by Llew when you couldn’t before?” Ard asked. “Think you can treat her right and forsake all others?”

“I already do.” Jonas paused, turning to face Ard. “Are you after a proposal of marriage, or somethin’?”

“I think with the way you two look at each other you should be goin’ beyond mere proposin’.”

Jonas chuckled. “What are you, a farmer-celebrant?”

Ard shrugged. “Well, not right now. But they know me in town. Know I’m of sound mind and good character.”

“Are you serious?”

Llew would laugh at him if he even tried to propose. They’d only known each other a few months. And in those months, lived a lifetime.

“As serious as you are,” said Ard. He patted Jonas’s shoulder before opening the door and gesturing him to exit back into the fresh air. “You’ll do what’s right.” Ard gathered up the muslin sack of bacon rashers and led the way.

They had kind of messed it all up, hadn’t they? Doing everything backwards – getting pregnant, losing their babies, then courting properly... They weren’t even doing that. They were too familiar. They’d skipped several steps. Did that mean he should bow out gracefully, admit he’d done her wrong and make way for a better man? Or did it mean he needed to become that better man?

Back in the kitchen, eggs were cracked and bread broken, and Jonas sat across the table from where Llew sat between the farming couple and wondered if what he wanted was right. He wanted her. More than he’d wanted anyone. But Ard was right. There were social conventions they’d skipped right past. Were they there simply to make others more comfortable? Or did Ard have a point? If they truly loved each other, perhaps they should make it official.

Despite everything, it was the best breakfast Jonas had had in weeks. The food was fresh and the company chipper.

Merrid and Ard delighted Llew with tales of her folks, riveting even Jonas with the role the couple played in Llew’s father’s defection from the Turhmos army and later smuggling her parents across the border.

“Orinia never felt safer,” Merrid was saying. “And surrounded by the enemies of their enemies, I suppose they couldn’t have been. But it made correspondence almost impossible.”

“When did you last hear from her?” Braph asked.

Llew stiffened and Jonas glared out the corner of his eye. He didn’t want to make a scene at this table.

“When Llewella was perhaps four winters. Orinia was put out that Llewella was developing into a real daddy’s girl, always down at the forge, always by her father’s side.” Merrid’s smile dropped when she caught the glimmer in Llew’s eye, and she ran a soothing hand over Llew’s head and down her back.

“I think I met her once,” Braph said.

The mood around the table became tense. Llew’s gaze grew steely. Hisham grew still and Jonas readied to knock his brother’s teeth out. Ard leaned forward to shove a chunk of buttered bread into his mouth.

“Llew looks a lot like her.” Braph picked up a chip of bacon from his plate and popped it in his mouth, chewing it loudly. “You wouldn’t think it likely I’d stumble upon the one Syaenuk in a place as big as Quaver, but what kind of place would the world be without wonder, eh?”

“Yes.” Merrid continued to soothe Llew with her caresses, oblivious to Braph’s hints.

Jonas didn’t know what his brother was trying to achieve. Except, perhaps, a rearranged face.

Llew’s eyes threatened bloody murder at the one-armed Karan. She threw a crunchy piece of bacon between her teeth, initiating a renewal of everyone else’s appetite.

Until the staccatoed thunder cut across the sky above.

Llew froze mid-chew. Ard held a butter-dipped knife over another chunk of bread. Hisham paused with a scoop of soft egg nearly to his lips.

Eyes scanned the ceiling, directing the ears’ focus, but it was little use. The sound was loudest through the open window. There was no sense of direction or proximity.

Jonas thought of the horses in the corral – Llew’s golden and white hack and his own bay and white warhorse, too distinctive to miss – and he was out the door and in the yard in a second. Chino, trained and used to his Syakaran speed, walked calmly into the stable when directed to do so.

Llew’s horse presented a different challenge, but not one Jonas couldn’t handle. Grateful that he’d left the panicking animal’s halter on, he gripped the leather and pulled. Wild eyes cast over him, not really looking, only seeing terror, terror everywhere, bearing down from above, coming up from below... The horse was no match for him. If only it would see that, it would know the fight wasn’t worth it. Clicking his tongue ineffectually, he tugged. The horse’s hooves dug into the loose grit. And skidded.

A tremor of surprise went through the beast, but still it tried to fight him.

He pulled, and the horse followed, leaving a trail of scrapes through the sand. The horse finally relented as a shadow fell across its head and he led it to one of the stalls.

Chino stood in another, calmly awaiting instruction.

Still the sound reverberated around them. Jonas took the chance to poke his head out of the stable.

The sun was a white glow through the featureless grey shroud. No flying object. He inhaled readying a sigh of relief. Then he saw it. A dot. Hovering a little north. Right about where they’d met the patrol last night. He had little doubt that through the shifting mist, the flying machine’s crew could see what had become of their countrymen in the night. He also had little doubt that from the two sightings, they could calculate direction and the likely speed of Jonas’s crew. He cursed under his breath.

The flying machine – Braph’s helio-something – swung out of its hover and started moving closer, following the road. Jonas’s breathing became slow and deep, as if that would be the difference between being spotted and remaining free. He’d never faced anything like this.

The flying machine was perhaps still a half-hour’s leisurely ride away when an almighty bang rocked the landscape and the thunderous thrum sputtered, the growing dot plummeting, wavering, recovering some height despite the continuing troublesome sounds. It diverted from the road, swinging away over the fields.

Jonas took the distraction as a chance to race back to the kitchen. No one had moved, all still rooted to their bench seat. All except Braph, who stood at the door looking out.

“They’ve broken it!” Braph declared. “I barely got to try it over ten feet, and they’ve gone and broken it! Louts, the lot of them.”

Jonas pulled up short in front of his brother. “Can they repair it?”

“They got it going so, yes, they can get it going again.”

Jonas pushed past. “Then we’ve got to move.”

“Where will you go?” Merrid shot to her feet. “There is nowhere safer than here.”

“They’ll come. It’s only a matter of time.”

“And we will shelter you.” Merrid sidled out from between table and bench. “Come.” She walked through the front door, oblivious to Braph, and Jonas went after her.