The Queen of Grass and Tree (Southwind Knights #2)

Chapter One, Part 5

They made camp away from the road. Galen assembled a small fire and forced the prisoner to lie down as Asher and Finn settled on the other side of the flames. The Healer fed the man and reapplied the salve to his wounded eye. The prisoner grew quiet, like a baby at his mother’s breast, and finally the Healer lugged him over to the horse and mule, laying him to rest for the night.

“If he moves, knock him out,” Galen told the mustang, pulling his bow and quiver from the saddle. He turned to Asher. “Going to hunt. I won’t be far.”

After a day filled with pained cries, the quiet night and crackling fire were unspeakably soothing. Asher soaked in the peace, lying back in the grass and relaxing his limbs.

“He’s crazy,” Finn said. “I can’t believe he was a Knight.”

Asher looked up at the stars. Finn was probably right, but it didn’t matter to Asher. He and the Healer had somehow become connected. It was a feeling he’d always shared with Finn, though it was missing as of late.

Finn’s tone darkened. “What happened?” he said, and Asher’s heart beat faster. “In the Cove. You’re so quiet now. It’s creepy.”

Against his will, Asher’s mind returned to the Cove. He wasn’t ready to tell Finn, especially with the prisoner nearby. The man had said that one of Victor’s volunteers had been a friend. Asher remembered them all—particularly the ways they died, whether torn apart or burned to ash. He hadn’t spoken of it, and Finn only knew what everyone had been told: that Victor and his company died to save Asher from the dragon.

“Forget it,” Finn said.

“The unicorn,” Asher said. “The one who gave us the cure. She was beautiful. More than beautiful.”

Finn sat rapt.

“But the dragon—” Asher searched for words to describe the nightmare. “I can’t talk about.”

It was his best explanation, and it seemed to appease Finn for the moment.

“I want you to know,” Finn said, “that I’ll always owe you—and Sir Victor. I won’t forget.”

Asher ached to tell him the truth about Sir Victor, about how the Knight had killed Tailor, but Finn was suffering enough with his father’s death. Asher shrugged.

“Once we get to the Institute, you have to tell them about the dragon,” Finn said. “I bet they’d let you in.”

Asher thought they might, but he said, “I don’t know.”

“The Queen’ll probably have a statue made or something.”

A hacking laugh came from the prisoner, followed by a pained grunt. The mustang stirred.

“Only thing you’ll get from her,” the prisoner said, laboring, “is a knife in the back.”

 “Keep talking like that,” Finn said, looking over his shoulder at the bound lump in the horse’s shadow. “The only thing you’ll get from her is a noose round your neck.”

Asher had assumed until then that the rabble-rouser attacked Galen out of vengeance for his friend. But the man had slighted the Queen twice now, and Asher wondered if there was more to his actions. Why had he come to Southwind in the first place?

The prisoner croaked something unintelligible and went silent.

“I said don’t talk to him.”

Asher sat up as Galen reappeared, a pair of birds dangling from his belt.

“We weren’t,” Finn said.

The Healer slung his weapons back over the saddle. “Go to sleep.”

Asher said, “I’ll take watch.”

It was their first night away from home. As Galen and Finn slept, Asher fed the fire and sat watching the flames. The night was quiet and empty. He pulled the unicorn horn from his bag and stared at it for a while. It was smooth and solid in his hands. The tip was still a deadly point.

Taking the horn, he eased the tip into his forearm until he felt the tickle of pain and saw a fleck of red. He dragged the cut out an inch. As it had that morning, the bleeding stopped as soon as it started, and the scratch faded away, healing before his eyes.

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