Four days in the saddle had taken its toll and, in spite of the worries plaguing her, she quickly drifted into a deep, dreamless sleep.
So deep, it felt like only moments had passed when she startled awake, a crushing pain bearing down on her back.
And a sharp blade resting at her throat.
“I thought that might wake even a heavy sleeper like yerself, my lady,” a rough voice said from behind her.
She was awake all right, but with the weight of some villain’s knee pressing into her back, she couldn’t lift her head to identify her attacker.
Slowly, she edged her hand out, but as her fingers raked the edge of her blade, the weapon skittered out of her reach.
Two of them, then. The one holding her down and the one who’d kicked her weapon away.
“No, no, lass. No weapons for you,” the second one said with a chuckle. “The way I figure it, a woman out here all alone, she’s either a runaway or a criminal. So which is it?”
“The horse is too fine for a criminal.”
A third voice, off to her left.
“She could have stolen it.”
A fourth man, on the other side of the fire.
“No. You saw her mounted as well as I did. The tack fits her too well to be stolen. Looks to have been made for her special, right down to the fancy sheath. I’d venture to guess she’s running from a new husband.”
They’d been watching her all evening. How could she have been so careless as to allow herself to be captured like this?
“Let’s have a look at what we’ve found, aye?”
The weight was lifted off her back and a hand fastened on her collar, dragging her up to her feet. There were indeed four men, spaced around the campsite, warriors from the looks of them. All leering at her like she was a piece of fresh meat up for auction.
“What in the name of the holy mother is that all over her face?”
The man holding her grabbed her chin and turned her face around for his inspection. “She’s been marked, Hamish. It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before.”
One of the others approached to peer down at her face. He licked his thumb and scrubbed it back and forth across her forehead while her captor held her still.
“Whatever it is, it’s no coming off. Whoever put it there meant for it to stay.”
“Must be she belongs to somebody. Mayhaps they’ll pay to get their property back, aye? Anyone who went to this kind of trouble to mark it must want it badly.”
The four of them laughed at that, as if the idea of ransoming her off was one of the best they’d had.
She stilled, remaining silent as the men surrounding her plotted. Carefully, slowly, she inched her fingers toward the knife hidden at her waist.
“We’ll check the villages we pass through while we search for the boy. Mayhap we’ll go back to Tordenet wealthier men than we left.”
Tordenet?
Her hand froze as she considered her predicament. She hadn’t just been careless enough to have been taken prisoner by a band of wandering villains. She’d been taken by Torquil’s men.
She rapidly reassessed her situation. Escape from them now would be close to impossible. But since they were looking for the same ones she’d been tracking, biding her time would be no hardship.
Her best course was to let them do the heavy work of locating their prey. By then, surely she’d be able to work out the means to a successful escape.
Twenty-two
SQUATTING ON THEground, Hall rubbed a bit of dirt between his fingers and tilted his head, straining to catch any sign of the sounds he’d heard earlier. Overhead a distant thunder rumbled, setting a frown of concentration on his face.