CHAPTER FIVE
The pounding echo trapped inside Druz Talimsir's aching skull woke her. Rough leather bound her hands at the wrists, and she'd lost feeling in most of her fingers. The scent of loamy ground filled her nostrils, threaded through by the thick odor of a cookfire and the stink of meat charred on the outside while grease dripped from the center. Men's voices carried on constant conversations and evidently never-ending arguments.
"There's nothing to fear by letting them know you're awake."
Druz recognized the calm voice as the druid's and opened her eyes. She didn't move. Even if the druid was right, she didn't want him to think she was responding to his voice. He was part of the reason she'd been taken by the slavers. There was no way she was going to believe the slavers had managed to approach him without him knowing, but she had no idea why the elf hadn't warned her.
For one brief moment, she thought that maybe he was working with the slavers. No one knew for certain what the Emerald Enclave's true agenda was in the Vilhon Reach. Most were in agreement that the druids didn't care for cities or further expansion of civilization, but taking up with slavers from Nimpeth was surely something they wouldn't even consider.
"They've settled in for the night," the druid said a moment later.
The cookfires had told Druz that. She opened her eyes and saw the druid sitting next to her. Leather strips bound his hands as they did hers, attached to a padded, heavy chain that lay across the ground. All of the other slaves were bound to the same chain. Druz pulled at the leather with all her strength, but she succeeded only in drawing the attention of one of the guards.
"They caught you, too?" she asked as she pushed herself into a sitting position.
The druid hesitated only a moment. "Yes."
Druz knew at once that the druid was lying. There was no way the slavers would have been able to keep up with him in the forest.
"Why did you stay?" she asked.
He turned toward her and said, "Because I agreed to let you accompany me on the hunt for the rogue wolf."
"Getting captured isn't going to get that done."
Druz struggled to keep the defeat from her voice, but it was hard. She knew what lay in store for all of them-including the druid if he wasn't as good at escaping as he evidently thought he was.
"I didn't want something to… happen to you," the druid replied.
"I'm not going to believe you're concerned about my welfare."
His green eyes regarded her dispassionately as he said, "Would you be concerned about mine?"
"No more than anyone else I don't know," Druz replied truthfully. She held up her hands, dragging the heavy chain up after them. "I wouldn't have wished this on you."
The druid nodded. "Nor I you." He paused for a moment, glancing back at the campsite, then said, "However, if something happened to you, there would be no witness to tell the man who hired you that his son had been avenged. Other hunters would be employed, and more wolves would die."
"And that's what worries you?" Druz didn't even try to keep the sarcasm from her voice.
Shifting his dark gaze back to her, the druid said, "Those men would die, too. Would that concern you?"
Druz considered the possibility only for a moment. Images of other hunters getting picked off one by one in the forest filled her head.
"If you killed those men," she said, "they would put a bounty on your head."
"Yes."
Or maybe there already is one. The thought occurred to Druz in a flash. It wouldn't have been the first time a druid from the Emerald Enclave was marked for death by one of the cities of the Vilhon Reach.
She said, "I don't even know your name."
The druid was silent for a time. He shifted against the tree, uncomfortable, and said, "I am called Haarn Brightoak."
Druz shook her head. Knowing his name now, when they were both captives, somehow made the situation worse. She pushed her breath out and tried to relax.
"You should have escaped."
"I couldn't," Haarn replied.
"Because of me?"
The druid gazed at her and said, "Partly, but if I hadn't surrendered myself, these men might have tried to get away."