Agatine (Terres book II)

Chapter Fourteen

Armand pulled his foot out of his boots, sighing as the air wicked the sweat from his toes. His limbs hurt from all the practicing he'd done on Jonah's request. He thought did alright by himself in the caravan, when Griffon trained him and then later on he trained himself. Jonah was an entirely different animal. He made Armand fight with live steel, and when he fell, he didn't wait for him to get up. He traced his fingers over the shallow cut in his cheek where the metal had made contact.

He'd seen Rannok a few times out of the corner of his eye as they walked around the square after, in to get a cup of spice and then to buy themselves bowls of bread filled to the brim with steaming stew. Armand almost didn't want to believe it, at first, that he was following them. But as the day wore on it was more and more obvious. Everywhere they went, Rannok was sitting in a bench and reading a book, or sitting in an alley, or just following along behind them from a few paces off.

He was glad when they got back to the shitty little apartment and Rannok was nowhere to be seen. He fished around in his pocket to check how many ingots he had. There weren't enough that he could afford to lose them to Darius again. He was fairly certain he cheated at card games, since the only one that ever seemed to come out ahead of him was Jonah.

A mighty crash made Armand jump. He turned toward the doorway to see Darius' burly arms pinning Rannok's behind his back, crushing his wings. Rannok's expression burned like hellfire. Armand's eyes locked with his and for a second there was a faint glimmer of recognition before Darius threw him to the ground.

"What's this?" Jonah asked, climbing up out of his chair. Armand's stomach felt like he'd swallowed a brick. He stayed where he was seated while Jonah grabbed Rannok's forearm and hauled him to his feet. Rannok let out a muffled groan, like it hurt.

"He's up to something. Been following us around all evening."

"Is that so? Why were you following us," Jonah said. A dangerous glint flashed in his eyes. Rannok glared back at him. Armand closed his eyes and willed the whole thing to stop, because he knew what was going to happen next. It was like watching reavers fight, loud and terrible but you couldn't make yourself look away.

"I wasn't--" 

Armand winced at the crack from Jonah's fist colliding with Rannok's jaw. He reached a hand out, then lowered it again and prayed that no one saw him. Rannok let out a pained sound and turned his head away.

"Don't lie to me, boy, I don't like trade-dodgers. I noticed you, too, all day today." Jonah gestured at Armand. "Didn't you see him following us?" Jonah grabbed Rannok's head by the hair and forced him to look in Armand's direction. Armand glanced at Jonah, then at Rannok and the panicked look in his eyes. It was then he realized it. There was nothing he could do. Nothing he could say would make them let Rannok go. They were going to kill him anyways. So he nodded.

"Yeah, I did."

Rannok's panicked look twisted into a glare. Jonah shoved Rannok to the ground and kicked him squarely in the side. Rannok cried out and Armand rushed forward, then stopped once he realized he didn't know what he was rushing forward for. Jonah picked him up by the collar while Darius pinned his arms behind his back. He punched him a few more times in the face, hard enough that Armand could feel Rannok's head spinning.

Darius grinned as Jonah's fists pounded Rannok over and over in the chest and the stomach and the face. He landed a sickening punch against one of Rannok's wings and Armand swore he heard a crack, but he wasn't sure. He winced every time Jonah threw a blow across a new bone, raining down like hail until Rannok started to scream and sob. Armand couldn't watch anymore. He folded his arms, turned his face away, and did his best to drown out the worst of it.  

"Please, stop," Rannok begged. Jonah punched him in the gut. Rannok retched. Jonah grabbed a fistful of his yellow hair and twisted his head back, then slipped a dagger out of his pocket. He pressed the edge of it to Rannok's neck. 

Armand's breath caught in his chest. His eyes flew wildly around the room, searching desperately for something, anything to help.

"What? Are your little whore friends going to miss you? I know how your kind are. You sleep all day and drink all night, and your little birds think they have secrets." He leaned his face a little bit closer to Rannok's. "They don't. I know all about your--"

"--I think he's probably had enough," Armand said. Jonah looked up at him, face clouded with rage, eyebrows almost comically raised. He pressed the point of the knife into Rannok's throat. Rannok let out a whimper that made Armand cringe. Then his eyes relaxed and he let go of the knife. Darius shoved Rannok to the floor, where he laid and did not move.

"Ah, I'd forgotten you're not used to this," Jonah said. He draped an arm around Armand's shoulders, leaning his face close to his ear. Armand shuddered. "I'll let you take him outside and do what you want with him. Make sure he doesn't come back." He let go and shoved Armand to the side a little ways, like he was offended. 

Armand grabbed Rannok's arm and jerked him to his feet. He didn't want to look at the other boy's face. He wobbled as he stood. Jonah gave him one last crack across the back for good measure. Rannok stifled a scream as Armand dragged him outside and around the side of the building.

"What are you doing?" he demanded. Rannok looked him in the face and Armand winced.  The front of his shirt was a mess of red, and his cheeks were already colored with bruises that spilled out around his nose and down his jaw. His front lip was split down the middle and pouring blood along with his nose. His left eye had begun to swell shut.

"Don't worry about it," Rannok said, managing to look angry through his one good eye. "Not like you tried to stop them."

"I couldn't. What if they--"

"What? Beat you bloody and almost kill you?" Rannok let out a halfhearted laugh, but it wasn't a funny sort of laugh at all. He looked Armand in the eyes and Armand shrank to the size of a mouse.

Suddenly he remembered that first training day. When he'd knocked Rannok to his feet and kicked him until Griffon made him stop. At the time he'd been so angry he could barely think straight. Now he understood. He understood why Griffon stopped him, even though it meant having to deal with Aegan. Who knew what he would have done to him if Griffon hadn't showed up in time.

"Don't worry, I won't come back. I'll tell Wren you said Hi," Rannok spat. He turned and limped down the alley, back in whatever direction he'd originally come from.

Armand watched Rannok go until he was just a shadow in the night. She's alive. Armand's heart floated on clouds for a moment, until he looked back in the direction of their apartment. It sank back down again like an arrow. He knew now that it never would have worked, no matter what she said or how she'd responded. Not here and not in the caravan, either. Somehow the thought of it didn't hurt him as much as he imagined it would. 

He walked back to the sellswords' apartment. Jonah greeted him with a smile, like nothing had happened, while he cleaned Rannok's blood off their floor. Armand didn't know much. He didn't know where he belonged or where he came from or even where he was going. But he did know one thing. He knew that Jonah was not his friend, and that the man could not be trusted. He only wished he'd figured it out earlier.