Healing Ties (Ties, Book 2) | ✓

Chapter 11

It was late afternoon before Yore spotted the peaks of the Farntara Mountains. The mage's shorter stride had slowed them a bit, but not as much as Yore had been expecting. Now that he was no longer injured, he had a great deal of tenacity. He walked without complaint, hour after hour, and he didn't once ask for an extra break.

That was typically true of most slaves but not, in Yore's experience, expensive Companions. They were trained to obey without complaint, but they were also usually very much not used to those kinds of physical demands being placed on them.

Yore stopped walking and frowned as he looked out at the mountains and then back at the mage. He had been thinking all day about how he was going to do this, and the only way he'd come up with was one he hated very much.

"We have a problem," Yore said.

The mage already looked scared. "Yes, sir?"

"I can't leave you on your own because you might run away and get into trouble again, but I also can't take you where I'm going. Not yet."

The mage nodded along as he listened.

Yore sighed. "I want to tie you to a tree. And blindfold you. It wouldn't be for long — maybe half an hour. I just need to go and get a friend of mine."

The mage was silent for a long moment. "You want to tie me up?"

"Yes."

"With... with, um. Do you have rope, or...?"

"I have a shirt and the know how to turn it into something resembling rope."

The mage didn't say anything. He was staring at the ground.

"Is this not going to be okay?"

The mage shook his head. "No— I mean, I— It will be fine, sir. I ran away last time. You can't know that I won't do it again."

"Thank you for being understanding," Yore said as he started taking his shirt off. "I wouldn't do this if you really had a problem with it, but I'm not sure how else I could resolve this situation."

"I know," the slave murmured, his eyes flicking over Yore's bare chest.

Yore cut his shirt into strips and then tied and braided them together until he had something resembling a rope. Not a very long one, but he could make it work.

"Here, come and sit against this tree," Yore said, pointing to a small tree of about the same thickness as his arm. "I don't have enough rope to tie you around your chest, so I'll tie your wrists behind your back around the tree. Hopefully the tree's small enough that the angle won't be too uncomfortable in the time I'm gone."

The slave sat down against the tree and obediently put his hands together behind his back. This didn't feel right, but Yore didn't know what else he could do at this point.

"I don't think you're going to try to grab me again, but fair warning: I'm much stronger and much faster than you. You were only able to get me last time because I didn't realise what was happening until it was too late. Unless you can do what you did in a split second, it's not going to work."

"I won't," the mage said. "I promise I won't. You don't have to be scared of me."

"I'm not scared of you," Yore said as he began tying the mage's wrists together. "I'm respectful of you."

Though, what he was doing just then didn't feel very respectful. It felt awful and wrong. The mage dropped his head and stayed silent and still.