The Reader

Chapter Three - The Standoff

Chapter Three.

 

He barely got a glimpse of her beautiful, smooth face before her legs shot out and wrapped around his. She twisted like a snake and he tumbled, landing heavily on his back.

The air escaped his lungs with a whoosh. He rolled away, but as he did so one of her flailing feet connected with his cheek. Stars erupted before his eyes. He tasted blood. Tom cried out as the smell of burning pervaded the air.

Dazedly, Merric pushed himself to his feet. He gripped the side of the wagon, swaying unsteadily, forcing his eyes to focus.

The blurry shapes in his vision slowly took form. Before him stood the woman, blazing eyes focused on Merric. She had her left arm wrapped around Tom's neck, a dagger at his throat. A gag lay around her neck like a scarf, and the chords she had been bound with were scattered in charred pieces at her feet.

She was unlike any woman Merric had ever seen. She wore all black: leggings, knee-high leather riding boots, a long sleeved blouse, leather jerkin and a wide leather belt cinched tight about her slender waist. Her long, dark brown hair tumbled in careless abandon over her shoulders. Eyes blue as the summer sky burned like gems in her heart-shaped face.

She was incredibly beautiful, but that wasn't what took Merric's breath away. It was her very aura: one of power and assuredness. The muscles he could see lightly chording her legs beneath the cloth looked to be hard earned. Her face and neck were tanned a delicious golden brown, and the hands that held the blade to Tom's throat were not delicate and painted. From the way Tom was wincing, Merric judged her strong.

He stared slack-jawed at her, rendered incapable of acting. Disconnected thoughts chased each other through his head.

The clatter of chain mail and heavy boots announced the arrival of a squadron. They came at a parade-ground jog-trot and spread out, surrounding the wagon. Each aimed their crossbow at the woman. The commander, a short, rat-faced man wearing the stripes of a corporal, stepped forward. He had a riding crop in his right hand, and a sabre sheathed uselessly at his left hip.

"Drop the hostage or you'll get a half dozen bolts in your flesh," he announced loudly. Neither the woman, nor Merric, moved. Tom let out a small whimper as the ride of his Adam's apple cause the sharp blade to dig slightly into his skin. A small rivulet of red ran down. Merric watched it as though mesmerised.

Angry at being defied, the weed-like man slapped his crop against his boot. The crack made Merric jump. "Last chance, wench."

The woman finally acted, taking her gaze from Merric's face and flicking it to the corporal's. He drew back a step, unease shadowing his expression as those beautiful eyes bored holes in him. He looked over his shoulder to one of the men, whose finger twitched ever so slightly on the catch. The woman shifted her weight slightly, putting Tom between her and the bolt.

"Leave me be and I'll go peacefully," she said. Her voice was a gilded sword; simultaneously beautiful and deadly. The corporal wavered, unused to dealing with women in this manner.

He looked once more to his subordinate, noting the way the man's finger was curled over the lever. It would take a split-second for him to exert enough pressure to loose the arrow. This small fact gave the leader courage. "No," he replied, but it sounded like a question.

She tilted her shoulders in the ghost of a shrug. "Then you deem this man's life worthless." Her grip on the dagger tightened and she drew it an infinitesimal measure across Tom's throat. He cried out, struggling. She jerked his head higher, making it difficult for him to resist. Her dagger finished the journey, gouging a tiny, thin red line in the skin. It wasn't enough to kill him, but it was enough to show that she meant business.