Chapter 7

CHAPTER SEVEN

“ W ake up, lads! Wake up!”

The jarring shout of an unfamiliar voice startled Alaric out of his stupor. He and Lucia had been waiting by the fire for a while by then, neither of them speaking, and at some point, he must have fallen half-asleep, his mind drifting into nothingness. The man’s call, though, was more than enough to wake him and when he looked at Lucia, he found her staring at the burning coals, as if her gaze had never left them all this time.

Immediately, the clearing was flooded with men, all of them emerging from their tents, and Alaric was on his feet, his hand grasping the hilt of his sword. Next to him, Lucia didn’t seem particularly bothered by the fact that they were surrounded by several warriors, all of them ready to kill them both at their leader’s order.

Alaric searched among them for the man with his gaze, but it was difficult to tell if their leader was there. Then, someone walked through the crowd, emerging from the shadows, and Alaric instantly knew him to be the leader, even though he didn’t recognize the man. He seemed to be a little older, his dark hair streaked with grey strands, but he was tall and muscular just like Alaric himself—a man who didn’t shy away from action, that much Alaric knew for certain.

With a step to the side, Alaric positioned himself between Lucia and the men, acting as a shield in front of her. He couldn’t help it; it didn’t matter how skilled she was or that this had all been her plan in the first place. She may not have been a damsel in distress, but she was a damsel nevertheless, and Alaric would be damned if he let something happen to her.

“What is happenin’ here?” the man, the leader of the Ravencloaks—or at least the leader of this faction of the Ravencloaks—asked. “Who are ye?”

“I am Lucia an’ this is Alaric,” Lucia said, her voice loud and clear through the clearing, without a hint of fear in it. “We subdued three o’ yer men, stole yer supplies, an’ ye didnae even ken until now. What does that say about yer men?”

Alaric’s entire body was tense, ready to fight at the first hint of trouble. It didn’t help that Lucia seemed more than eager to insult this man and his people, when they were all so clearly prepared for battle. One wrong word could get them all killed, and it seemed to him that Lucia didn’t really care about that.

“It tells me I must kill those three,” the man said, glancing at the guards Lucia and Alaric had subdued. By then, all three had woken up, but there was nothing they could do when they could neither move nor scream. “What need dae I have fer them if they cannae even keep watch?”

The men’s eyes widened in fear, but gagged as they still were, they couldn’t even make a noise of complaint. Alaric tried to swallow down the panicked knot in his throat. He didn’t want to watch those men slain in front of his eyes, even if they were criminals.

“I suppose ye dinnae,” said Lucia with a shrug, and with the kind of coldness that Alaric still didn’t expect from her, even though she had shown that side of herself to him a few times already. “But that isnae me concern. We came here tae prove tae ye we belong in yer ranks.”

The man laughed, the sound sudden and grating, so mocking that Alaric had to grit his teeth to stop himself from saying anything. As he walked closer, Alaric stood his ground, not moving an inch from where he was placed in front of Lucia.

“An’ what makes ye think I will allow ye intae me ranks?” he asked. “I could just as easily kill ye along with those three.”

“Ye could,” Lucia agreed. “But why would ye? If ye kill them, ye will need someone tae replace them, an’ we are worth more than yer three useless men.”

More muffled protests followed from the three guards, but Lucia, along with their leader, disregarded them. The two of them were locked in a staring contest, neither of them speaking and neither of them willing to look away first.

It was up to Alaric, then, to step in, as he was certain this man didn’t care about anything Lucia had to say. She had been right to assume they wouldn’t allow her in on her own; not just that, but they also didn’t care about anything she had to say.

The only problem was, he didn’t know what to say for the man to listen to him. Lucia had already made a good point; one he didn’t know how to follow. Still, he tried his best. Maybe if he reiterated what Lucia had already said, the man would be more likely to listen to him, he thought.

“We bested yer men,” Alaric said. “We could have taken yer supplies. In fact, we could have killed several o’ ye, an’ nae one o’ ye would even have kenned until it was too late. Aye, it’s true that ye can kill us, but we came here tae prove our worth an’ we did. Why would ye waste our potential?”

Alaric recognized it, that gleam in the man’s eyes as he finally listened to reason. Behind him, Lucia huffed in irritation, no doubt seeing the same thing. The man’s actions had only confirmed her belief that she wouldn’t be able to make herself heard without Alaric there, and suddenly Alaric found himself glad that he had agreed to come. Who knew what could have happened to Lucia had he not been there? The Ravencloaks wouldn’t have listened to her and she wouldn’t have backed down without a fight.

“Alright,” said the man. “We can always use more men. But the lassie… the lassie is an issue.”

Before Alaric could say anything on the matter, Lucia stepped forward and said, “I am his wife. He daesnae go anywhere without me.”

A stunned silence followed, most of all by Alaric, who didn’t know what to think or say. Lucia claiming they were married was the last thing he had expected to hear, and after that, he heard nothing else. His ears buzzed with the rush of blood to his head and his heart skipped beat after beat, the shock and confusion settling heavy upon his shoulders. What was he supposed to do now? He couldn’t reveal that Lucia was lying, nor could he claim she was somehow mistaken. Everyone in the Ravencloaks now thought they were husband and wife, and Alaric had no choice but to go along with it and hope that no one would figure out the truth any time soon.

“Is that so?” the man asked with an amused chuckle, turning to look at Alaric. “Dae ye truly go naewhere without her?”

Alaric swallowed with an audible click, gritting his teeth for a moment. “That is true,” he said. “She’s me wife. Dae ye have a wife?”

“Nay… nay, I cannae say that I dae,” said the man.

“If ye had one, ye would understand.”

“Ach… young love.”

“This means nay one here will ever put a finger on her,” Alaric interrupted him. “Is that clear? She is mine and mine only.”

“Well, it cannae be helped if she’s yer wife, I suppose. Is that nae right, lads?”

A chorus of whispers echoed around the clearing. Alaric couldn’t make out what everyone was saying, but he could tell some were agreeing with the man, while others were still grumbling, uncertain and displeased by the prospect of having a woman among them.

Eventually, one of them stepped forward and said, “there has never been a lass in the Ravencloaks an’ so it should remain. What does she have tae offer? She will only slow us all down an’ put us in danger.”

Alaric was still reeling from Lucia’s claim to say anything on the matter. He felt unmoored, as though the mere thought of being her husband was enough to rattle him down to the bone, more so than anything else in his life. He had been through countless fights. He had survived battle after battle, mission after mission, and yet this had shocked him to the core, leaving him unable to react in any way.

“I’ll prove me worth tae ye,” said Lucia, and it was this which finally snapped Alaric out of his trance. “I will fight any o’ ye right now.”

Another wave of murmurs rocked the clearing, but Alaric didn’t move from where he stood in front of Lucia, even as the men expressed their interest in such a fight. Logically, he knew she could defeat, if not everyone, then at least almost everyone in that clearing. He also knew that no matter how vicious the fight became, no one would dare harm her badly, not when her alleged husband was standing right there, ready to intervene. Still, the thought of her fighting any one of those men unsettled him, but what unsettled him most was the fact that he had become so protective of her in such a short amount of time.

Why should he care what happened to Lucia, he wondered? Why should it matter to him what happened to her any more than it mattered to him about anyone else? If anything, he should be glad for an opportunity to get out of this obligation and return home, where he could go on with his days and marry his betrothed, have the family expected of him, and live a content life.

He was anything but glad. He still didn’t trust her, not nearly enough to be allowing her to do this, dragging him along with her, but the urge to protect her was stronger than any mistrust.

“I think that is fair,” said their leader with a small shrug, though he didn’t seem to believe Lucia could succeed in such a fight. It didn’t surprise Alaric; he hadn’t expected it either, until he had seen her dominate that rink at the inn. “What dae ye say, lads? Should we see if our wee lady can fight?”

Jeers and laughter erupted around the clearing, the men amused by their exchange. When Alaric glanced at Lucia over his shoulder, though, she didn’t seem amused at all. She was only staring at the leader, her features set into a mask of determination. It was then Alaric knew that no matter who fought Lucia, she would do anything it took to win.

That was precisely what he feared. In her quest to prove herself, she could also get hurt. She could become reckless, chasing her victory without any regard as to what it could cost her. It was already too late, though; Alaric couldn’t interfere, not when the leader had already all but accepted her challenge.

“I’ll fight her, Callum.”

The voice belonged to a large man, who stepped right up to the leader—Callum, apparently, was his name. The man was as tall as Callum himself and nearly as broad, with a thick neck and large hands calloused by years of wielding a sword.

He was not the kind of man Alaric wanted Lucia to fight. Though he was older, he towered over her and he bore the same scars as Alaric—scars which spoke of a lifetime of violence, thus a lifetime of experience. Lucia had her own scars, of course. Alaric had seen them just the previous day, the expanse of her back covered in them. The sight had given him pause, chest aching at the thought of how much pain she must have gone through to be scarred like that. Few of the scars he bore were as deep and as jagged. To think all of Lucia’s were like that sickened him and made him wonder who it could have been to put them there in the first place.

“Lachlan wishes tae fight her,” Callum said, turning to his crowd. He was more like an entertainer now in Alaric’s eyes than a leader of a vicious gang, gesturing widely with his hands while Lachlan breathed like a bull next to him and Lucia observed them both silently, utterly still. “What dae ye say? Should I let him?”

The men, naturally, agreed, much to Alaric’s disappointment. A part of him wanted to step in and demand that he fight in her stead, but he knew Lucia would never allow such a thing. If anything, she would only be furious with him for interfering with her plan and not allowing her to do the one thing which could gain her the respect of those people, and Alaric was not yet blinded to the truth: this was, indeed, the only way. Lucia had to prove herself through battle, with no one else helping her.

Anything else would only brew resentment and hatred among the men. Lucia had to become one of them by defeating one of them.

“Let them fight, then,” said Callum, stepping back to open up the space for Lucia and Lachlan. Before Lucia could get too far, though, Alaric couldn’t help but grab her arm and pull her close, whispering in her ear.

“Are ye certain about this? Surely, there are other ways.”

Lucia didn’t pull back from him, but her cold gaze told him that all she wanted was to yank her arm away and fight him, as well.

“I am certain,” she said, and there was no hint of hesitation in her voice. “I ken what I am doin’, Alaric. Dinnae fash.”

With that, she pulled away from him and stepped closer to Lachlan, both of them drawing their swords at the same time. Alaric had no choice but to step back into the sidelines, where he could do nothing to save Lucia from a well-aimed strike of Lachlan’s sword. He had no choice but to watch and to let this fight unfold as it was meant to.

In his chest, his heart beat rabbit-fast, erratic and syncopated. He watched as Lucia moved closer to Lachlan with the practiced ease of a predator, like a wild animal waiting to strike.

This was a dangerous woman, he realized. There was nothing about her he could trust; and yet, he could not take his gaze away from her.