The Ippos King (Wraith Kings #3) - Grace Draven Page 0,81

in case she tried to lunge for him. Tall and rangy, he moved with a feline grace. Blessed sanity stared back at her from his eyes. As one of her captors, he was her enemy, but he didn't make her recoil the way Chamtivos did.

“Water,” he announced, holding up the cup. “Dasker poison always makes a person thirsty once they're awake. I'll give you a drink, but if you try to bite me, I'll make you eat the cup.”

His warning, issued in a mild-mannered tone carried no less impact than if he'd snarled it at her. Given half a chance, she'd kill him in her bid for freedom, but were their positions reversed, she'd have told him the same thing. And she was terribly thirsty, her tongue practically sticking to the roof of her mouth every time she spoke. “No biting,” she said. “I swear it.”

They studied each other before he nodded and carefully tipped the cup to her lips. She drank, resisting the temptation to guzzle the water and spill half of it down her chin. Once she emptied the cup, he set it aside.

“I'd give you more, but to drink your fill now will only make you vomit it all up later. Let the poison's effects fade a little more, and I'll bring you another. Do you have to piss?” Puzzled by and wary of his consideration, she nodded. He whistled and called out names. Three men answered his summons, all carrying either a bow or crossbow. Each one nocked an arrow as they drew closer. “I'm going to partially unbind her,” he told them. “If she even twitches toward me, shoot her.”

Grim nods and drawn bows aimed at Anhuset made her pray she only twitched in the right direction.

“Don't make me regret my kindness by kicking my ribs in or my jaw loose,” her dubious benefactor warned as he worked at her bindings. “Forget modesty and take care of your needs. Try anything else, and they'll turn you into a pin poppet.”

“Understood,” she said.

He worked the straps loose, freeing her wrists from her ankles. Blood rushed back to her fingers, and she stood on wobbly legs, still dizzy from the poison's lingering effects.

Relieving her bladder in front of onlookers didn't bother her. Running off into unknown wilderness just to hide your bare arse from others was foolish when you were on patrol or guard duty. She was no fine lady to worry over such notions, though the reality of having three broadheads trained on her while she answered nature's call wasn't to her liking.

Her partial freedom only lasted as long as it took her to finish. She was once more escorted back to her spot in the mud where Chamtivos's man retied her in the same position, though this time he didn't do it so tight that her fingers went numb. She glared at the gag cloth he held up. “Don't tell me you expected differently,” he said, one eyebrow arched. “If I had a mouth full of teeth like yours, I'd be gnawing on my bindings every moment I wasn't observed.”

He knotted the gag at the back of her head and left her with a pair of guards, taking the same path that Chamtivos had to the tent. Was Serovek in there as well? It was the only place in the camp itself big enough to hide a person. Everyone else had pitched small lean-toes hardly big enough to cast a square of shade or didn't bother with one at all. That tent served more than just the purpose of luxury for the group's leader.

She'd have to bide her time and strategize a way out of this dilemma before Chamtivos decided to enact whatever entertainment he had planned. It would mean leaving Megiddo behind, but the monk had something neither she nor Serovek did: value. He'd be safe for a short time.

Cramped, cold, and hungry, she shifted from side to side to keep the blood flowing through her limbs. Several escape plans played through her mind, each one ending with her either shot, skewered, or dismembered for the attempt and Serovek still held captive. She gave up temporarily, allowing her racing thoughts to settle. Her guards didn't talk to her or pay her much attention. She listened to their idle conversation. And learned.

For all his swagger and self-importance, Chamtivos wasn't particularly well liked by those who followed him. These were peasants and yeomen under the command of a nobleman's youngest son. They'd been loyal to his