Heir of Thunder (Stormbourne Chronicles Book 1) (2 page)

The sounds of demolition faded as we rode, but the smell of
my burning home lingered in my nose for hours. Gideon and I rode in silence throughout
the morning, the sight of his broad back growing familiar as the day passed.

He wore a long suede coat, dark riding breeks, and tall
leather boots. His honey-brown hair trailed between his shoulder blades in a
long, loose tail. His hair was the only soft thing about him. Rigid angles
composed his shoulders and face, and one deep dimple accented his left cheek.
It appeared whenever he grimaced.

I had no memory of ever seeing him
smile.

We rode south through a thick forest. In summer, the rowans
and oaks unfurled their leaves in a canopy thick enough to block much of the
sunlight. On this early spring day, however, the first tender and newly
sprouted shoots sifted the sunlight over us in lacy patterns that softened
Gideon’s austere figure.

Even then it took me the whole
morning to work up the nerve to speak to him again.

“Gideon?” I prodded Nonnie with my knee, moving her into a
trot. When she brought me even with Gespenst, I reined her back to a walk. “Can’t
you tell me anything?”

He peered at me from the corner of one, cold eye. “There’s a
stream about a half mile ahead. We’ll take a break then.”

I nodded and dropped back into place at Gespenst’s rear.

We followed nothing resembling a trail, and Gideon seemed
unconcerned with the one we left as we traveled, but when we reached the water,
he took care to lead his horse downstream a short distance before dismounting
in the midst of a thick copse of cattails.

Gespenst slurped the water in greedy
gulps, and Nonnie went to join him after I slipped from her back.

Gideon dug in one of his packs and retrieved two strips of
venison jerky. He tossed one to me before crouching and shoving his water skins
into the stream. “I didn’t have time to do this before we left. Make sure you
fill yours now. We won’t stop again until sunset.”

The recent snowmelt from the mountains caused the water to
rush in a torrent and come to the bank’s edge.

Gideon had filled both his skins
before I finished digging mine from Nonnie’s saddlebags. I knelt and drank
straight from the stream, sipping from cupped hands. Several icy drops dribbled
down my neck, and I squealed at the shocking cold.

He spun in my direction, grasping a dagger in his fist, and
assessed our surroundings with a wary eye. “What is it?”

“Sorry,” I said. “The water was cold.”

He grunted and turned back to his bags, stuffing the dagger
in a sheath belted to his hip.

“Do I get to know where we’re going?” I wanted to slip off
my boots and shove my toes in the water, but he probably would have
disapproved.

On a normal day, his consent or
displeasure meant little, but something horrible had happened, and he risked
much by taking responsibility for my safety. He deserved a little consideration
and respect.

“We’re going to Braddock.”

“Braddock?” I had never traveled beyond of the borders of
our estate, except for occasional trips into the village, but I had studied the
maps in Father’s library and heard stories of his travels many times. Braddock
was situated at the extreme southern tip of our island—at least a day’s travel
by train, longer by horseback. “Why are we going there?”

“To get a ship.”

“A ship?” My voice sounded small and shaky. I coughed and
tried to clear my throat.
Will he always feed me information like this—one tidbit
at a time?

He stopped his busy work in the saddlebags and answered,
keeping his ever familiar back to me. “Yes, we’ve got to get you as far away
from Fallstaff, and Inselgrau, as possible. Where did you think we were going?”

“I don’t
know
!” My panic returned, and my heart crept
into my throat. I felt bad enough leaving Fallstaff, but taking a ship meant
leaving Inselgrau altogether. Gideon might as well have said he was taking me
to the moon. “I don’t understand what was happening back there, and I’m not
likely to figure it out on my own. Won’t you tell me something, Gideon? ...
Please
?”

He wore his arrogance like a shield, a façade. I suspected
he wanted to keep people away, although I never understood why. When I’d asked
him that question, I had expected more of his usual aloofness, but instead he
exhaled and his shoulders sagged.

He met my gaze, and the granite in
his hazel eyes softened, turning from stone into stormy skies—no less fearsome,
but somehow more approachable. “You’ve been sheltered,” he said. “You loved him,
and I don’t want to ruin your memories.”

“Are you talking about my father?”

He rubbed his smooth jaw and looked away. “I suspected the
people of this island would look to fill his place with one of their own after
his death.” He glanced at me again. The hardness returned to his eyes, as well
as the set of his chin. “They don’t want another Stormbourne ruling them. I’m
surprised it took the people this long.”

“That doesn’t tell me much.”
What complaint do the people
of Inselgrau have against my family? What offense have we committed?
“I still
don’t understand.”

“No, I don’t expect you do, and we don’t have time for me to
explain it. We need to get around the next town before sundown. I don’t know if
we’re being followed, but I don’t want to take chances. We need to keep moving.”

“The train would be faster.”

“Obviously, which is why it’s most certainly being watched.
And the coach-ways. As long as we stay off the main roads, horseback makes us a
lot harder to follow, and we need to be invisible for as long as possible.”

A chill trickled down my spine, and I turned away from him before
he could see on my face the sickness caused by his words. In my haste to
escape, I hadn’t considered the consequences of leaving Fallstaff. My house had
been crashing down around my ears, and survival had been my only concern. It
was still my primary goal, but it came at the cost of abandoning my home and
the people, like Gerda, whom I considered family, especially after my father’s
death.

I was young, inexperienced, and lacked powerful allies, the
kinds that could have established a counterattack or resistance. How could I
have known such a thing would be needed? The only men at arms my father had kept
were a small group of trained fighters he had called his Crown of Men. Where
were they in my time of need? Why had my father’s horse master been the one to
take charge of my security?

Why... why... why? So many
questions. So few answers.

“Evie?” Gideon said my name in a soft way.

I waved him off and busied myself
checking Nonnie’s tack and stowing my water skins. His sympathy did little to
ease my nerves. Mostly, it made me more uncomfortable.

“Ready?” he asked.

I nodded and mounted Nonnie, and we
fell into place once again behind Gespenst.

For the rest of the day, we kept to ourselves in the hazy
twilight of the constant forest. As nightfall approached, we skirted the edge
of a small village called Valsparre. Once we had put the town to our backs,
Gideon brought us to a halt.

“We’ll stop here for the night,” he
said.

I slipped down from saddle and prepared to make camp,
although I had almost no experience with such things. Nonnie seemed glad when I
released her from her saddle and bit, and I led her beside Gideon and Gespenst
to a nearby stream.

“We won’t camp near this creek,” he said. “It drowns out
distant noises, and I wouldn’t be able to hear if anyone’s approaching. When
the horses are finished here, come back to the place where I first stopped us.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to start a fire, get some water boiling. I don’t
know about you, but it might be nice to have something hot in my stomach. It’s
going to be cold tonight.”

He was right. The first and most audacious stars already
twinkled overhead. The night would grow chilly without cloud cover to hold in
the earth’s heat.

The horses dawdled at the water long after they finished
drinking. I stayed with them, reluctant to return to Gideon’s somber company. I
had chewed on his words for the entire afternoon, and couldn’t balance his
statements with my own knowledge. My father had been stern and rigid, but fair
and loving. He’d spent countless hours with me, showing me things in his
massive collection of books, teaching me how to run a household. He had begun
to outline his management of the kingdom, but he never advised me about what to
do if I ever needed to flee Inselgrau.

Perhaps Gideon had always been his
contingency plan for me in such an instance. Surely, he never expected to die
so suddenly, not when there was still so much I needed to learn. Something
was
wrong, though, no mistaking that. Something had gone terribly wrong, if people
wanted to destroy Fallstaff and chase the last Stormbourne away from her home.

Gideon would come looking for me if I didn’t return soon, so
I surrendered to the darkness and cold and headed back to camp. I had seen enough
disapproval on his face for one day, and Gerda’s warning about not annoying him
echoed in my memory—no need to inspire his further annoyance.

“Tomorrow, I’ll teach you how to build a fire and set rabbit
snares,” he said when I returned. “I’ve already set some while you were gone. I
packed enough dry goods to get us through tonight, but we’ll have to gather
food when we can.”

I nodded and sank to the leafy ground on the opposite side
of the campfire.

A small pot bubbled and steamed on the fire. Hunks of
carrots and potatoes swam in a thin broth—vegetables that would withstand the
jostling of saddlebags, so it made sense for Gideon to pack them. He had also
thrown in a few strips of jerky and a handful of wild onions.

I inhaled, savoring the stew’s homey smell, and my stomach
grumbled. “You still don’t know if anyone followed us?”

He shook his head. “I don’t, but it’s better to be safe than
sorry. We’ll take turns sitting up tonight, watching, just in case.”

For the rest of the night we did everything in silence:
eating, spreading our blankets, disappearing into the darkness to take care of
private necessities. Through some unspoken communication, possibly voiced in
Gideon’s stiff posture, I knew he intended to take the first shift of the
watch. I rolled up in my scratchy wool blanket and tried to sleep, but my
thoughts ran in circles filled with memories of my father.

I examined each one as it popped into my head, and tried to
find something that might support Gideon’s claims. If our people were unhappy
with my father as their king, it was new information to me. Either Gideon was
wrong, or my father had been careful to keep me ignorant about what went on
beyond the gates of Fallstaff.

I hoped it was the former, but my hasty escape and the hard
ground under my spine tended to support the latter theory.

“Go to sleep, Evie,” Gideon said.

“How’d you know I was awake?”

“I can hear you thinking all the way over here.”

“How do I turn off my thoughts after a day like today? How
can you expect me to sleep?”

He shifted and leaves beneath him crackled. “You’ll regret
it tomorrow if you don’t.”

“It’s not that easy.”

“It is. Focus on your breathing and nothing else. Empty your
mind. Concentrate on the blackness at the backs of your eyelids. You’ll be out
in no time.”

“Does it work for you?”

“Every time. Like Magic.”

***

I came awake with a screech when someone shook my shoulder.
A hand covered my mouth, silencing my protest.

Gideon whispered into my ear, “It’s
me, Evie. Don’t scream.”

In the darkness, my other senses took over and, for the
first time, I noticed his scent—leather, horses, wood smoke, and something else...
probably sweat. His natural fragrance suggested masculinity and strength.

He eased his hand away and said, “You’ll
need to take over for a while.”

I nodded and rubbed my eyes. The tip of my nose was cold and
my breath formed thin clouds. I scooted closer to the fire, which burned low
but warm.

He motioned toward the flames. “There’s
some tea left in the pot. You’re welcome to it.”

“Thank you.” I reached for my mug and braved a look at his
face. His expression seemed compassionate, although it might have been a trick
of firelight.

He immediately curled up in his blanket. “Wake me when you
feel sleepy again. I only need a couple hours. And if you hear anything, wake
me up right away.” He rolled onto his side and his breathing evened into deep,
somnolent breaths.

The tea tasted bitter and wild, but sipping it kept me
occupied and awake. The rest of the night passed in a rush, consumed by more
fruitless worrying.

A misty morning light had infiltrated our camp by the time
Gideon awoke. “You stayed awake all night?” he asked when I came back from
seeking privacy in a distant thicket.

I shrugged.

“You shouldn’t have done that.”

Is his voice always so unnecessarily sharp?
“I didn’t
intend to. Morning came quicker than I expected.”

His face softened, but in the next breath his mouth turned
down. “I hope it doesn’t affect your ability to keep up with me today. It’s
going to be a hard ride to get us to Braddock in two days’ time.”

“I’ll be fine.” I turned to go check the rabbit snares.

I came back toting two squirming
gray and brown hares, and held them up for his inspection. “I would have
skinned them, but I really don’t know how. Besides, I don’t have a knife.”

Gideon paused in his packing and studied the rabbits. “We’ll
have to remedy that.” He crouched and pulled from his boot a short, sharp knife.
With a subtle flick of his wrist, he sent the blade stabbing into the soil
between my feet.