Of Ash & Linen

On the third day of their journey, Ava saw the sands of the Kunguru dessert in the distance to the east. Kunguru was an independent nation that bordered Minore. The nation, made up mostly of desert and sparse grassland, was lined on its eastern coast by the Meiri Sea. Ava thought it must be nice to have such freedom on their doorstep. She envied the Kungu people, though she had never met one. They tended to stay away from Cincia. Evidently, they liked their freedom too.

On the fourth day, Ava saw nothing but trees. The Kunguru border had turned sharply east, following the edge of the desert, and withdrew further and further away as the road marched along its strictly northeast path. The desert was too far to be seen from here, not that she would have seen it anyway, given the thick forest the party was now navigating. It was a relatively small forest, compared to some of the ones she had studied on maps of Western Minore, but it still boasted some of the biggest trees Ava had ever seen.

It made her feel contained. She wasn’t sure if she liked it.

On the fifth day, the carriage’s shaking increased suddenly and substantially shortly after Ava finished her midday meal, if it could be called a meal. Moretta looked thoroughly put out by the shudders and jolts of the carriage. She put her knitting away, which gave Ava immense pleasure.

Ava leaned forward and poked her head out of the window. She had gotten into the habit of leaving the windows open to increase airflow inside the carriage, and she liked the views. It also made her feel slightly less like a glorified prisoner.

“What’s happening?” Ava asked Anthus, taking in his alert gaze and stance.

“We’ve just crossed into Voros,” Anthus replied without taking his eyes off of their surroundings. “The road is less protected here, being outside of Minoran borders.” He paused to smile at her, and then resumed scanning the trees ahead and to his right.

He must have noted the concern on her face because he added, “It’s nothing to fret about, my lady. Just taking a little extra care now that we’re no longer in the territory of the crown.”

Ava didn’t believe him.

She looked outside the opposite window and saw that Otis now had the same watchful air about him as well. She was certain that Antony, at the front of the party, was just as alert. Darius and Martis were stationed at the rear of the carriage, and the sixth man, Vergil, was the driver. Ava assumed he had earned that assignment because he was the oldest soldier in the group.

He was also the grumpiest. Ava hadn’t heard him mutter a polite word the entire trip. She was glad she didn’t have to see him, save for when they made camp at night. He was even more unpleasant when the group stopped that evening, still in the depths of the supposedly small forest.

Ava avoided him throughout dinner, which was much more muted than the soldiers’ usual boisterous routine. The men kept their voices low and their eyes watchful. Ava grew warier as the evening progressed.

Tonight, she was glad for the guard that followed her to her tent and slept outside of it. She was aware of the sounds of the forest that night and stayed up, alert and tense, listening for a long time.

Nothing happened.

Ava awoke to the usual bustling of the guards breaking down camp and reloading gear. Readying herself quickly for the day wasn’t hard because, despite Moretta’s initial objections, Ava had slept in her traveling dress. She had been too nervous of nighttime attackers to take it off. Somehow it made her feel more prepared to face danger when she was fully dressed.

Ava found the rest of the traveling party in slightly better spirits this morning, having survived their first night in Voros. Her only night in Voros.

The party had barely dipped into the northwest corner of Voros that jutted between Minore and Erdene. From her memory of the maps she often poured over at home, it was a narrow wedge of land that wouldn’t take them too long to cross.

“Here you are, my lady,” a portion of dried meat and fruits was pressed into her hands. She looked up to see Otis. He gave her a quick nod, handed Moretta a similar bundle, and then returned to loading crates onto the carriage.

Ava grimaced at the meal. Maybe the Erdene traveling party would have better food.

“I’ll have it if ye won’t, lady,” Martis grinned as he tossed his freshly cleaned cooking pots into their canvass sack.

“I think I’m going to need it,” Ava took a small bite of a dried pear. “We’ll be reaching the Erdene border today, won’t we?”

“Aye, should be there with daylight to spare. Plenty of time for ye to get all sprucy for yer husband-king.”

This time Ava grimaced at Martis. She snapped off another piece of the pear with her teeth and jerked it away, all the while glaring at him.

He chuckled.

“You’ll be needin’ to improve yer stature if ye intend to set yer new husband’s pants a quakin’,” he stopped packing long enough to slap his knee with a laugh. “I don’t think that stare is as scary as ye think, ma’ lady.”

Ava could feel a small heat build in her cheeks. Ignoring him, she turned and climbed into the carriage.

Coralli had always given the most regal look when she wanted to intimidate someone. It was a look that every princess should have in their arsenal. Ava found that she could never master it, though she had attempted it many times.

A memory seized her.

Coralli stood in front of her with her shoulders back and her chin high.

“No one needs to hear of this, is that understood?”

The servant girl, much older than Coralli, nodded fervently as she cleaned up the broken shards of a rare imported vase. Ava had broken the vase while playing with a practice sword one of the guards had given her. She’d been carelessly swinging it as she twirled down the hall, lost in her imagination as usual. She must have been about eight at the time, which would have made Coralli ten.

The sound of the porcelain shattering had brought the servant girl and Coralli running around the corner. The servant had chastised her and intended to fetch Padovana. Coralli stepped in, protecting her as always.

That was the thing about Coralli. She used her position to help people, not to help herself. Ava couldn’t count all the times Coralli visited the city to bring food and clothing to the poor.

“It’s going to be fine, Ava,” Coralli had given Ava a tight hug, then the two bent to help the servant collect all the pieces. “I know where we can throw these so father won’t find them.”

The girls smiled at each other conspiratorially.

The carriage door slammed, and Ava was ripped from the memory. She looked up to see Moretta taking her customary seat across from her.

Anthus took up his post outside the window and nodded in greeting. The carriage gave a soft lurch and began its rhythmic march shortly after.

Ava’s thoughts returned to the broken vase. Despite Coralli’s efforts, she had gotten in a substantial amount of trouble.

Pernice had found them cleaning in the hall. She had promised not to say anything, only to blurt the incident out to king that night over dinner. Ava still remembered the look of contempt that Pernice had given her across the table. Contempt is an odd expression to find on the face of a six-year-old girl.

The king hadn’t seemed to care, telling his “darling” how fascinating she was and returning to his conversation with Ava’s father.

Ava had received quite the lecture from her father about it later and was never again allowed to handle a practice sword, or any other semblance of a weapon for that matter.

A strange sound once again drew Ava out of her thoughts. It sounded like a grunt. After a moment she leaned forward to look through her window.

Anthus rode into view, and Ava gasped. He was clutching the shaft of an arrow that was protruding from his neck. Blood poured over his fingers. His face was knotted in pain, and he was gasping for air. His eyes found Ava’s just in time for her to see the life drain from them. She screamed and reached for him, but he was too far. His body slid off of his horse and thudded onto the ground.

There were more shouts and more thuds. Moretta screamed as the carriage lurched again and began to speed down the path, cutting through the forest. Ava was thrown back against her seat, her knuckles white from her grip on the window. Moretta’s basket of yarn went flying as she clutched desperately at her seat edge. An arrow flew through the window and Ava wrenched her hand to her chest and moved away from the opening.

Looking up, Ava’s eyes were met with the wide, blank stare of her maid. Her mouth was open in a silent scream. The arrow had gone straight through her chest, pining her to the carriage wall. Moretta’s arms and head dropped in a lifeless dangle. She hung limply, swaying with the motion of the carriage like a ragdoll.

“Moretta!” Ava screamed as she irrationally lunged for her.

The carriage turned sharply in that moment, propelling Ava to the floor. Unprepared, she landed on her shoulder hard.

Thud. Thud. Thud. They were being barraged with arrows.

Martis galloped into view, taking up Anthus’s post. Ava could hear Antony bellowing at his men, ordering them to keep the formation tight and to ride faster.

She wondered if he knew his brother was dead.

Ava pulled her body back up onto her seat and forced her eyes away from Moretta’s limp form. She glanced through the window to her left to make sure Otis was there. He was, riding low to his saddle and keeping pace beside the carriage.

Another thud sounded on the roof of the carriage, but this one was different than the others.

Otis glanced up and grimaced.

A hand reached down through the window. Ava screamed again, more terror pilling on top of the mountain of fear she felt. Another hand came through the window followed by the face of a man with a knife clutched in his teeth.

In a flash he was gone, ripped away by Otis who tossed him to the ground. The carriage jolted and bounced violently when its rear wheel hit the man.

Ava covered her ears to muffle the screaming. This caused her to lose her balance again and she was slammed against the right side of the carriage. Pain shot through her already aching shoulder and down her arm, pulsing.

“Halt!” Antony yelled and Ava barely had time to grab the window frame to keep herself from being thrown about once again. The sudden stop caused her to slide to the floor on her knees. Her shoulder ached, but she quickly forgot about it when she looked up.

Outside the window, a man threw himself at Martis and they moved out of her view before she could see what happened. More heavy thuds sounded from the roof of the carriage, and men jumped to the ground on all sides, charging her soldiers.

They were attacking them from the trees, Ava realized. Her stomach hallowed with dread.

Horrible sounds assaulted her from every direction. Screaming. Grunting. Gurgling.

The scrape of metal. The thud of bodies. The whine of horses.

The chaos quieted, and Ava stayed very still, unsure of what to do.

“Is that all of them?” asked a strange voice, and Ava knew they had lost.

Terror has a strange way of seeping in and saturating the body. Ava’s body was a sponge, dripping with the excess fear.

A skittering of nervous laughter traveled through the men outside the carriage. Then Ava heard grunting.

“Here,” a man said. “Bind them.” More grunts followed.

The carriage door was ripped open so quickly that Ava gasped and bolted upright. A strange man covered in wood-colored clothing bared his teeth at her in a predatory grin.

“So, you’re what all the fuss is about,” he said. His eyes moved up and down her, assessing. Ava could not look away from his eyes, those terrifying eyes. Shock traveled a jarring course through her at the sight of them. Red, pure and bright as fresh blood filled his irises. Her trance was broken when he turned to take in the dead maid.

Another man peered in behind the first one and grinned, his eyes tinted crimson as well.

Ava shuffled back as far from the men as she could and pressed her back against the door in the opposite wall of the carriage. The door was suddenly pulled open behind her and she let out a small scream as she fell backward. Someone caught her under the arms as laughter erupted around her. Ava was jerked upright into a standing position.

Red eyes surrounded her, each pair a different shade. The fear and confusion that engulfed her was overwhelming. She closed her eyes and opened them again, refusing to look at their faces lest she be trapped by those impossible eyes. Instead, her attention landed on the felled tree that blocked the carriage.

It had been a trap. They had blocked the road before the attack, leaving them with no escape.

Stunned, she let the men drag her by the arm around the back of the carriage towards the other side. At the rear of the carriage she saw several bodies scattered sporadically down the path they had come. She wondered how far back Anthus’s body was. She wondered how many more of her guards’ bodies littered the road.

The first thing she saw when she reached the other side of the carriage was Otis, Martis, and Antony, all kneeling with their hands tied behind their backs and surrounded by their attackers. Otis looked dazed, Martis looked angry, and Antony looked indignant.

Frozen with fear, Ava did not fight when the men dragged her to stand in front of her three remaining guards. She was momentarily ripped out of her stupor by the sound of an awful gurgle. The sound had come from Otis. She scanned his body quickly and saw a gushing wound in his side. His face looked ashen and his eyes looked dim. She could tell he was struggling to stay conscious.

Her nature compelled her to go to him, but she was promptly jerked back by her captor.

Antony hissed.

The man who had found her in the carriage knelt before Antony. “So, you’re in charge, are you?”

“I am the leader of these men and charged with her safety,” Antony replied, not looking afraid at all. He did not flinch at the unsettling red of the eyes that stared him down.

Ava envied him in that moment, able to keep such composure when bound and captured.

“Will you deliver a message to your king for me, leader?”

“I do no bidding but the bidding of the crown.”

“You looked like the stubborn type.” This caused a round of laughter to erupt through the red-eyed men. So many voices. Ava looked to either side and saw several men and a few women gathered. The sight of the women clothed in battle gear fascinated her, but when she saw the red of their eyes she looked away quickly.

More men trickled in from the forest. This was no small attack. There had to be at least a dozen men and women here. They had been outnumbered from the start. Dread sunk to the bottom of her stomach like a stone.

“I didn’t want to speak to your king anyway,” the lead man said as he turned away from Antony. He nodded at a man who was also dressed in tree colored clothing as he departed. The man returned his nod and took two steps toward Antony, grabbed him from behind, and slit his throat.

The utter suddenness of it all gave Ava no time to look away, no time to prepare. The scream flowed freely from her mouth as she tried in vain to jerk her arm free. Her captor merely dragged her back to his side and laughed along with the rest of his men.

Martis was yelling and fighting against several captors of his own, his eyes never leaving the body of his commander. Antony’s body drifted to the ground, landing with a sickening thunk. The forest floor drank up his blood as it flowed around his throat in a small, black pool.

The red-eyed men finally won over, and pulled Martis, cursing and fighting, into the forest. Two men followed, dragging Otis’s limp body. Ava was pulled along last.

It only took one man to lead her.

This filled her with a deep shame that finally pierced the knot of fear monopolizing her body. Untangling herself internally, she sharpened her focus. She was no match for them physically, but she had strengths of another kind.

Ava vowed to observe, to take in as much as possible until she gathered some sort of information that might help her.

Her father had taught her that effective armies utilized their greatest strengths in battle, and her most valuable asset had yet to reveal itself.