A Reign of Steel. Morgan Rice

said nothing. Stara found herself reddening.

      “Is that it then?” she said. “Have we nothing else to say to each other? Is our business done?”

      Reece raised his head, meeting her eyes for the first time with a puzzled expression.

      Stara could stand it no more. She jumped to her feet and stormed away from the others, standing at the edge of the cave, her back to all of them. She looked out at the night, the rain, the wind, and she wondered: was everything over between her and Reece? If it was, she felt no reason to go on living.

      “We can escape to the ships,” Reece finally said, after an interminable silence, his terse words cutting through the night.

      Stara turned and looked at him.

      “Escape to the ships?” she asked.

      Reece nodded.

      “Our men are down there, in the harbor below. We must go to them. It is the last MacGil territory left in this place.”

      Stara shook her head.

      “A reckless plan,” she said. “The ships will be surrounded, if they have not already been destroyed. We’d have to get through all of my brother’s men to get there. Better to hide out somewhere else on the island.”

      Reece shook his head, determined.

      “No,” he said. “Those are our men. We must go to them, whatever the cost. If they are attacked, then we will go down fighting with them.”

      “You don’t seem to understand,” she said, equally determined. “At morning light, thousands of my brother’s men will litter the shores. There is no way past them.”

      Reece stood, brushing off the dampness, a fire in his eyes.

      “Then we shall not wait for morning light,” he said. “We will go now. Before the sun rises.”

      Matus slowly stood, too, and Reece looked down at Srog.

      “Srog?” Matus asked. “Can you make it?”

      Srog grimaced as he stumbled to his feet, Matus lending a hand.

      “I will not hold you back,” Srog said. “Go without me. I will stay here in this cave.”

      “You will die here in this cave,” Matus said.

      “Well then you will not die with me,” he replied.

      Reece shook his head.

      “No man left behind,” he said. “You will join us, no matter what it takes.”

      Reece, Matus, and Srog walked up beside Stara at the edge of the cave, gazing out into the howling wind and rain. Stara looked the three men over, wondering if they were crazy.

      “You wanted a plan,” Reece said, turning to her. “Well, now we have one.”

      She shook her head slowly.

      “Reckless,” she said. “That is the way of men. We will likely die on the way to the ships.”

      Reece shrugged.

      “We will all die one day anyway.”

      As they all stood there, watching the elements, waiting for that perfect moment, Stara waited for Reece to do something, anything, to take her hand, to show her, even in the smallest way, that he still cared for her.

      But he did not. He kept his hand to himself and Stara felt herself hardening, crushed inside. She prepared to embark, no longer caring what fate had in store for her. As they all stepped out into the darkness together, she realized that, without Reece’s love, she had nothing left to lose.

      Chapter Eight

      Alistair stood on the ship, terrified, arms bound behind her, her heart pounding as dozens of sailors closed in on her from all sides, a look of lust and death in their eyes. She realized that these men all aimed to rape and torture and kill her, and that they would take delight in doing so. She marveled that such evil existed in the world, and for a moment she struggled to understand humankind.

      Her entire life, she’d always been known, everywhere she went, as the most beautiful girl – and more than once it had gotten her into trouble. She just wanted to be left alone. She had always just wanted to look normal, like everybody else. She never wanted to attract attention – and she certainly did not want to attract trouble.

      Erec, swinging high overhead in the net, shouted down, helpless, infuriated.

      “ALISTAIR!” he yelled again and again, trying frantically to squirm out.

      The sailors below laughed, taking great delight in his capture, and his helplessness.

      Alistair looked at them and felt a great anger; she forced herself to be bold, fearless.