of her, he suppressed the urge to hold her tighter, afraid he might injure her.
“Great.” Willow smiled sleepily up at him, then stretched. “Give me another minute to regain my energy and then I can help you two figure out how to get everyone home without injuring them more.”
By the time Willow was able to stand—shakily, and while leaning heavily on Ruben—Tatiana had come around again. Despite Eric’s protests, she had gotten to her feet and gone to crouch near the cage, where a furious Chad still sat, glaring at them all with murder in his gaze.
“Are you all right, my love?” Tatiana gushed, attempting to reach through the bars to caress Chad’s face.
“Get away from me, you faithless whore,” Chad snarled.
At his words, Tatiana drew herself up straight, her injury apparently completely healed. “What’s wrong with you?” she demanded. “How can you speak to me like that, after we’ve made love? I know we’re meant to be together.”
Chad spat at her, contempt twisting his face. “I don’t want you. I never did. You and my brother deserve each other. Two fools.”
Shocked, Tatiana stumbled backward, nearly falling. Eric had come up behind her, and he caught her, though he moved now strictly from reflex, his jaw tight and his gaze hard.
“You slept with her?” Eric asked his brother, his voice completely without inflection. “The woman I planned to marry?”
Ruben couldn’t help but notice how the other man used past tense now. He couldn’t blame him. What kind of man would want a bride so faithless that she’d cuckold him with his own brother?
“What kind of man are you?” Revulsion plain in his every action, Eric set Tatiana apart, ignoring the way she desperately reached out to him, apparently realizing she’d lost it all.
When she touched his shoulder, he spun and turned on her. “For that matter, what kind of woman are you? We were supposed to wed. We’d even begun discussing wedding plans, for Bright’s sake.”
Most women would have hung their head in shame. Not Tatiana. She looked Eric straight in the face and smiled. “I will make it up to you,” she promised. “If you’ll let me.”
Not an apology at all.
For a heartbeat, Ruben thought Eric might strike her. The thought apparently crossed Eric’s mind, as he raised his hand before lowering it and clenching it in a fist.
This made Ruben actually like the pompous prince, who seemed to have a heart after all.
“The engagement is off,” Eric declared, in a hard, flat voice. “Do not come near me again.”
Disbelief flashed across Tatiana’s face. “You can’t do that. Our parents have already signed the marriage contracts.”
“They will be voided,” he said, and turned his back on her to mount his horse.
Since they were now one horse short, they helped Tatiana up on the front of the jail wagon, where she could ride with the coachman.
And then they set out as fast as they could for SouthWard. King Drem had explained that they would not be sent through the portal due to the prison coach and so would have a long ride ahead of them.
Ruben rode next to Willow, noting how she gripped the pommel of the saddle. More than once, she appeared to be nodding off.
“Are you going to make it?” he asked, aware he couldn’t let her see how worried he was. Willow’s earlier pale skin had now taken on a ghostly pallor. Even her lips, normally red, seemed bloodless. She barely showed enough strength to keep upright in the saddle.
Unsmiling, she nodded. “I think so.”
“Let me know if you need my help,” he said. “If you’d like to ride with me, I’m sure we can arrange something.”
His words brought a faint smile, though she shook her head. They rode on, pushing as hard as they dared. Luckily, neither Tatiana nor Eric seemed inclined to talk. Chad had folded himself up into a close approximation of a ball. He must have been weak from loss of blood.
Several hawks circled overhead, keeping pace with them. Ruben also got a sense that other creatures watched them from the shadows. If they communicated to Willow, she didn’t pass that information on. Perhaps they too were worried about her.
Finally, the landscape began to look familiar.
“We’re nearly home,” Willow said, confirming his thoughts.
The instant they reached the golden path that wound up the hill toward SouthWard keep, as though a message had been sent ahead, medics rushed out and tended to Tatiana and Eric. When they were deemed stable enough, they were transported