“You said you wanted to humiliate him, not kill him,” Sage observed. She was studying me as if seeing me anew.
“Vixor Rae has a commanding officer named Ritter traveling with him, observing him. He’s come under suspicion for his marriage to me. If he leads his Sworn—that Sworn, especially—into an ambush of treecrawlers, he’ll be humiliated deeply in front of Ritter.”
“If he survives.”
“The Silver Wolf is a good fighter.” I shrugged as if I didn’t care, but my shoulders and arms felt stiff as planks. Kassian was a good fighter, and if I told him about the treecrawlers first, he should be safe. Still, the thought of sending him into danger made me sick to my stomach.
“You’re even cleverer than we thought,” Sage said finally. “Now, can you let me up?”
I stood and stretched my aching knee, and she rolled over with a groan and rubbed the place where I’d knelt on her sternum.
“I’m going to have a nasty bruise there,” she muttered. “Thanks for that.”
I didn’t reply. I was thinking of the paper in my pocket, and about how I didn’t have any pencils or pens to write upon it.
“Come,” said Sage. “We should get farther away from the village if we want to light a fire and warm ourselves.”
I blinked at her. “We?”
“Don’t think you’ve gotten off the hook so easily,” Sage said. “The Order wants you watched over for a bit.”
“The Crims want me watched,” I corrected her sharply.
Sage shrugged. She had a sly way of smiling with one half of her mouth. “You say spice, I say pepper. Pretend it’s for your safety; I’m excellent with a spear and bow. Come on. It’s not like you can get far until your dog wakes up, anyway.”
She had a point there. Besides, I didn’t see any chance of shaking her, not without confirming any lingering suspicions that I was untrustworthy.
When Sage walked away, I removed my cloak and rolled Dog on to it, and then, dragging my companion behind me, I followed her.
CHAPTER FOUR
LATER, AFTER SAGE and I had walked a ways from the village and stopped to make a small fire in the shelter of a dry riverbed, I burned the end of a twig while Sage was relieving herself down the hill. I drew the precious paper from my pocket and smoothed it across my knee. I wrote quickly, explaining to Kassian what I’d said to Sage and what the Crims were thinking.
If my lie was going to work, he’d have to play his part.
I stared at the paper, willing words to come from him in return. I stared until my eyes ached and my vision swam, but no new markings marred the creamy white of the paper.
Before Sage returned and saw what I had, I folded the paper up and put it back in my pocket.
Then, I threw the stick in the fire.
“Hungry?” Sage asked when she returned.
I nodded, reluctant to share my vulnerabilities with this woman whom I didn’t trust. I’d eaten all my provisions and now was relying on whatever I could steal from farms or forage in the forest. Hunger pinched my stomach as Sage drew a thick wedge of cheese and a crusty loaf of bread from her traveling sack and offered half of each to me.
“Thanks.” I took the offerings and tried not to look too famished as I bit into the cheese.
Sage watched as I ate.
“What are you planning to do next?” she asked. “You haven’t tried to go north to the sanctuary cities. Are you hoping to return to your village?”
My village. Memories flitted through my head—Neil standing on a hangman’s scaffolding with a noose around his neck. My grandmother’s face in the crowd as I was led to the whipping block to be punished. Kassian’s face when he removed his helmet and looked at me for the first time in a decade. Those cold, cold eyes had caught me on fire.
“No,” I said. “There is nothing there for me now.” I paused my eating to break off some of the bread to save for Dog when she woke up.
“A wise choice,” Sage murmured. She picked a piece of crust from the bread and chewed it. “They wouldn’t accept you if you tried to return to them.”
“You speak as if from experience.”
She picked at the crust again. “I do. I was a Chosen, forced to serve a Sworn husband, forced to try to bear him children. I managed to escape before becoming pregnant, just like you.” She put down the bread on her knee and pulled back the sleeve of her cloak to show me the faint markings on her arm that denoted a wife of a Sworn.
She continued, “I tried to go back to my home. I had a mother and three sisters there. I foolishly thought they would run to me with cries of joy and open arms.” She spat in the fire and picked up her portion of the bread again. “I was wrong. The villagers pelted me with stones and threw mud and filth at me. I arrived at my family’s farm, bleeding and covered in excrement. My mother and sisters begged me to leave before the villagers burned down their house.”
Despite my mistrust of Sage, my heart tugged with pity at her story. “What did you do?”
“What was there to do? I left. I found the Crims and joined them. That was four years ago, and I’ve been doing this ever since.”
“Following ex-wives of the Sworn?” I meant it to be sarcastic.
Sage took me seriously. “Some. More women escape than the Sworn like to admit. There are people who dedicate their lives to getting Chosen women out of the city. I also spy and track Sworn movements. Pass information. That sort of thing.”
She fell silent, finishing the rest of the bread and eating the cheese next with precise, methodical movements. We sat on opposite sides of the fire, chewing quietly, lost in our thoughts. I reached out a hand to pet Dog’s still form while I thought.
I was supposed to be meeting up with Graysoul’s contact. But what did I know about those people? Graysoul had helped me escape the city, yes, but would her contacts have the means to help me?
The Crims were a connection to Kassian. If I worked without the organization, maybe I could discover how I might convince him to ask for a reassignment.
A wild hope, perhaps, but I clung to it anyway.
Sage watched me, waiting for me to say something.
If I worked with the Crims, I wanted it to be on my terms.
Perhaps, if I explained my idea…
It was worth a try.
Finally, I spoke. “I want to help the Chosen girls.”
“It’s not easy getting them out of the city,” Sage said. “The Crims have tried. If we could cut off their means of breeding—”
“Not from the city,” I said. “Before they’re taken. I want to intercept the Chosen girls from their villages and take them straight to the sanctuary cities of the Crim.”
Sage looked thoughtful. “A few have done it. Hard to do, though. The Sworn swoop in quickly, most of the time. As soon as they know there’s a Chosen girl in an area, they come and collect her. They don’t want to risk losing any precious breeding stock. But since a girl can’t receive the mark to see if she’s Chosen until she’s had her first menses, there’s no particular time when they can plan to come and take girls.”
“So, there’s a window of opportunity,” I said. I remembered my own experience of being tested and found Chosen. My monthly blood had begun, and my body was changing from a girl’s to a woman’s. The Sworn found me and slashed my arm with their claws, making a hideous symbol. Over a few weeks, the wound would heal and scar, and if a girl’s scar remained dark and raised, almost like a tattoo, then the Sworn, when they returned, would take her to the capital. If her scar healed into a faint, pinkish seam, she was inert. Unable to bear werewolf children.