HerOutlandishStranger Page 12

  “Let her go,” Jazz said again, quiet and reasonable. He hoped.

  The four other men came forward, nearly as slowly as he had done, wanting to defend their comrade, but clearly uninterested in getting involved in a brawl. One of them muttered that he had lost his taste for fighting long ago.

  “Come on. Curb your temper,” another of them advised. “We have at least an hour’s walk to camp and I want to get some food. Let them go.”

  Only the one man who burned with fury wanted blood. Without warning, he thrust Eliza hard toward Jazz. Jazz staggered as he caught her by the shoulder to stop her fall. He swung her around and shoved her behind him with one smooth movement.

  By the time he regained his fighting balance, the young soldier had produced another, larger knife. The blade glinted as he sprang into a deadly lunge.

  Jazz reached out and caught the man’s face easily and twisted. Another single motion, as effortlessly performed as a well-rehearsed dance step.

  The snap was sickeningly loud and the angry young man died before he hit the ground. For a long, horrible moment the four men stared down at their comrade.

  “Broken neck,” one of them said.

  “Holy Mother,” another breathed.

  Jazz held his empty hands out to them. They cursed him fluently, but backed away. When they were a safe distance they took off at a run.

  Eliza was about to thank him for saving her when she saw Jas’ expression. His face was white and his eyes blank with anguish as he stared down at the corpse’s face. A small dribble of blood ran down his arm.

  “You’re hurt!” Eliza cried. She rushed to him and rolled up his sleeve.

  He glanced down at his forearm where the Spaniard’s knife had nicked him. Eliza had out her handkerchief. She pulled at his arm. “I must make a bandage, Jas. Let me see your arm.”

  “No. Not now.” He took her handkerchief and absently pressed it to the cut, but his attention was on the figure of the dead man.

  “I didn’t have to do that,” he whispered as if he addressed the man. “I didn’t stop myself. I thought… I hoped. I stopped before, with that other attack. I thought I could stop myself every time.” His eyes filled with tears and he turned to look at Eliza as if she had an answer for him. “They—said—they kept warning me that I’d have the skills. All this time I was sure they were wrong. I had control with that other man. But… Skills! Oh gah, what a name.”

  He knelt down on the road then leaned over his knees. Within a minute, the tears flowed down his cheeks. She stooped beside him and put her arms around his shoulders. She rocked back and forth, hugging him just as he had done when he’d held her and murmured comforting words.

  At last she made out the words he was muttering. “Wild response nonsense. H-how do you stop this? These tears?”

  “Time,” she said. “I think that’s all that will do it.”

  “I can’t seem to stop.” And she realized he was asking literally how he could stop crying. She couldn’t think of another answer, so she kissed his hair, held him and waited.

  Within a few minutes he dragged himself to his feet. Without a word, he walked over to the corpse. He pulled Eliza’s papers out of the corpse’s pocket and handed them to her. Then he settled cross-legged on the ground and methodically pulled the possessions from the man’s pockets and the bag at his belt. He looked the objects and letters over carefully and made a pile next to the man.

  When he was done, he just as carefully tucked most of the letters and trinkets back into the pockets. He held up a small cross on a chain and stared at it curiously for a long time, spinning it gently with a forefinger.

  “The man was a follower of the Christ then?”

  At that instant, a surge of nauseated confusion hit Eliza. Jas was a creature completely apart from anything she’d ever known. No other remarks he’d ever made, nothing he’d ever done— not even the minutes earlier when he’d effortlessly killed—made him seem as alien.

  “Yes,” she whispered, almost afraid of him. His eyes followed the twirling cross. He didn’t seem to notice her reaction.

  “What sect, do you suppose?”

  She moistened her suddenly dry lips with her tongue. “Much of Spain is Roman Catholic.”

  Jas nodded. He reached into his bag and pulled out the small block of wood that was never far from his hands. He smoothed it for a moment. Then to her surprise, he quietly spoke the Latin words of last rites to the corpse. His voice was soft and intimate as a man bent on comforting a child. Then he carefully, slowly made the sign of the cross.

  He looked up at Eliza for a moment. “Can you write Spanish? I mean, if I told you what to write you could do it? I-I don’t have good handwriting.”

  She was still cold with the fear from the encounter with the soldier. And the sight of Jas staring curiously at the cross. She whispered, “I think so.”

  He pulled out pieces of paper from the pile he hadn’t tucked away. “I want to write to his family.”

  He handed her one of the grubby papers, a billet of some kind, blank on one side.

  “We need to leave. Those men—”

  “They won’t be back for at least an hour. You heard them. Their camp is far away. Please, please. Write this message for me.” He handed her a stumpy pencil he’d gotten from the man’s pocket.

  She nodded, understanding it really was for him. Folding her skirts, she knelt on the dusty road next to him. He stared at the corpse as he spoke.

  “Write ‘this note is from the man who killed your loved one. His death was a stupid tragedy’.”

  He examined the papers in his hand for a moment before continuing. “Juan Molinero was a brave man, defending his country…”

  ”Jas, he planned to ravish me and kill us both. He wasn’t defending—”

  He shook his head. “Please. Just write. ‘He was defending his country and before he died he spoke of his departed sister with love and anguish. I wish I could turn back time’. No, no Liza don’t say that. No. Please write, ‘He did not deserve to die. Even though it was done in a time of war, I will spend my life mourning the death of one so young and full of potential. May God bless you and keep you’. Do you think that’s enough?”

  She nodded, knowing that it was never enough for a dead man’s family, but had to be enough for Jas. Her sensation that he belonged to an alien race was almost dispelled now. She could imagine her father might say that no man could be so concerned for others, even his enemy, and not be a Christian. She looked over at the dead man. The fear she’d felt when he was alive, and the bloodthirsty triumph she’d felt at his death were as long gone as if they’d never been there. She, too, felt only a sense of waste.

  She watched Jas tuck the rest of the man’s things away along with the note and pencil. Then he pulled her to her feet. He slung their belongings over his shoulder and they walked again. This time silently and away from the road. She had to trot to keep up with his longer-than-usual strides. She would not let him get too far ahead of her. Not when his face wore that blank look of devastation. As she trotted along, she wondered that she read this strange creature so well, and more than that, she was amazed that a man who had no real God could be so dear to her.

  For the first time in their journey, Eliza was the one to call a halt to the day’s travel. She wondered if Jas would have walked through the night if she hadn’t spoken. She found a spot on the rocky soil, nearly free from pebble and rocks, and spread out the cloak. She sat down on it, waiting, and watched him for a few minutes. She had not planned to discuss the incident, yet she could see from the bleak look that filled his eyes he was thinking of nothing else. She finally spoke. “Where did you learn how… How do you know how to fight like that?”

  After a long silence, he answered, “I was taken into the army when I was ten years old. I fought for several years.”

  “What army would use such young boys?” she whispered, but then covered her mouth. She had heard of British soldiers as young as thirteen.


  He gave a short laugh without a trace of humor. “We were fine little soldiers. All trained for C.Q.B.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Close-quarters battle. By the time I turned eleven I knew how to kill a person twelve different ways with just my thumbs. Our commanders had us and some other terrible weapons. I think they decided it was an easier way to get rid o-of the enemy. Didn’t waste ammunition. The side we fought for lost, I’m glad to say.”

  “Dear God,” she said. “I’ve never heard of such a war.” But unlike every other time she’d expressed her ignorance of events he described, she felt no disbelief. She’d seen his ability first hand.

  His explanation seemed familiar and she realized it reminded her of the story he’d told her of Madame Blanro. Of course that had been a myth. Nothing more. Dear God, she couldn’t stand to have the one comfort in her life be so alien.

  He lay down on his back, apparently unconscious of the stones on the ground beneath him. His voice was distant as he spoke. The blue of his eyes were as blank as the darkening sky he stared into. “I expect news of our war won’t reach these shores for a while.”

  “Did you…how many people did you kill?”

  He exhaled slowly. “I have no idea. I don’t know any names or any of their faces. I don’t remember any of it. From the time I was taken until I was captured there is nothing. I remember most of training but the rest—it’s almost like I had slept through the whole thing.”

  “That is surely a blessing.”

  “Is it?” he asked. “For me maybe. But what about for anyone I killed? Or for the people who loved them? I never really understood that until today. It isn’t fair to them.” His voice choked. “Ah, damn, I’m starting up again,” he said with thick disgust. “How do you control these things?” He rolled onto his side and curled into a ball.

  “Tears?” she asked, bemused. “I don’t think you ought to try to stop them, Jas. Just allow them to flow. Don’t you know how to cry? I believe you have had more than your share of sorrows to cry over.”

  “Can’t recall doing this. Don’t actually see the point,” he whispered and then let her hold him again as he shivered. He rolled back and forth in agony and she stopped him by cradling his head on his lap. At last he ceased and rolled away from her to sit up.

  “Thanks, Liza,” he murmured after he caught his breath.

  “I have done nothing,” she said sorrowfully.

  “Then thank you for not hating me.”

  “How could I? I cannot forget that you saved my life today.”

  He nodded and unceremoniously wiped his face on his sleeve like a child.

  “Yes. And that is most important.”

  For a moment she was stung, thinking his remark ironic, but then she noticed that the despair in his face had faded. He even smiled at her as he climbed to his feet again and began to look through his sack.

  “You must eat,” he said.

  “Another of those wretched squares?” she asked.

  “We will run out of them soon and I’ll have to hunt for food. Easier now that we’re near woods again. But I don’t want to deal with any more death tonight.”

  She took the square without another word of complaint.

  She resisted the urge to reach over and trace the lines between his brow, then rub them lightly away.

  They moved to a nearby spot beneath some trees to block the wind. The nights were still freezing, but they’d moved south of the highest terrain, which meant they were not so cold they worried about freezing to death. As Liza spread her cloak—no, she reminded herself…his cloak—on top of the blanket, she wondered if the weather was less harsh because they were moving south or because of spring. Then she realized she didn’t know the date or how long she’d been traveling with the strange Mr. White. Surely a long time. His voice, his laugh, his eyes were so familiar and dear to her.

  Yet when she thought about the stories of the war he’d told that day, and stories he’d told her other days, she perceived that she couldn’t know him completely—for she didn’t know his people at all.

  The sight of the cross dangling from his hand flashed into her mind. She shivered even as she pressed herself to the familiar solid back. And there was his childlike astonishment at tears and the solemn way he spoke of magic. For a moment she again tested the idea that he was insane. No, of course not.

  That cold nausea filled her again. If he was sane then what did it all mean? She pushed hard against him, trying only to feel the warmth of him against every inch of her front.

  She could almost taste each of his deep, steady breaths.

  Though she drew comfort from his muscular frame, and was swamped by her usual desire for him, she could not banish the fact he was entirely unfathomable.

  Chapter Ten

  Jas kept his promise to hunt. When he showed up with a dead, bloodied chicken she closed her eyes at once and waited for the dizzying nausea to pass. He knelt beside her and silently handed her one of the squares. She ate it with no desire or hunger.

  “I managed to find the thing and kill it,” he told her when she could face the dead bird. “I must have hunted before. But I have never done the next bit.”

  “’Tis simple. Pluck and clean it,” she said, and realized she’d never had to do that either. After the servants had left them, her father had done that chore.

  “Go ahead,” he offered. They both gazed down at the scrawny body.

  She gingerly put a hand out and touched the bird. A slight breeze ruffled its feathers. She started and quickly drew her hand back as if she’d touched something live.

  “Same thing happened to me,” said Jas. “Scary, eh?” She looked up and met his gaze, and suddenly they both were laughing. They laughed so hard tears came to their eyes.

  “Huyo,” Jas gasped at last. “L-Liza, this doesn’t— Doesn’t make sense. Damn tears are starting again.”

  Eliza looked over at the powerful man who was undone by the body of a skinny chicken and by laughter and tears, and she doubled up with even stronger gales of laughter. Naturally, that pushed him over the edge again too.

  When they finally managed to stop and regain their ability to inhale, Eliza snatched up the bird. “I shall do the honors,” she declared. “It is certainly time I did something useful.”

  Jas disagreed. “You’re doing the most useful thing possible. You’re carrying new life.”

  The bird dangled from her hand, forgotten, as she stared at him. To hear aloud the thought that the baby was something other than a disaster or nuisance thrilled her. “Thank you for those words,” she said at last. But she again grew businesslike at once. “Lend me your knife, please. I shall turn this wretched bird into a meal. We’ll cook it and then carry it for our luncheon.”

  The scent of the roasted chicken was too much to resist. While it was still hot, they wrenched off bits of meat and ate, scalding their fingers and mouths. Then they moved off quickly, hoping no one had caught the scent of their feast.

  They only traveled for a couple of hours more.

  Jas came to an abrupt halt. Something about his suddenly stiff back alarmed Eliza.

  She turned in a circle, searching for signs of trouble. “Is something wrong?”

  “Just gotta stop for a while.” He took a few steps away from the path and suddenly sank to the ground.

  She ran and knelt down next to him. “What is the matter?”

  He gingerly rolled up the sleeve of his unscarred arm. “Huy! Looks like Juan Molinero got a bit of his own back. I’ll have two scars, eh? Wonder if he had poisoned it.”

  Eliza gasped. The small cut on his golden skin was puffy, red and oozing. A red streak went from the wound up to his shoulder. “Good Lord! Oh Jas we must find help.”

  He shook his head. “No. I can take care of it. I need to rest. That’s all.” He shivered and Liza put a hand to his forehead.

  She gave a cry of dismay. “You have a fever. Oh, if only I knew the proper way to cup y
ou. I will do what I can.”

  Jas’ smile looked more like a grimace. “Liza, please spare me that sort of treatment. I have a bit of medication from my mother. I’ll lie down. That’s all I need.”

  She wrapped her arm around his waist. “Lean against me.” He slowly rose to his feet and allowed her to coax him to a small sheltering orchard of olive trees where he sprawled on the ground with a groan.

  “That’s better,” he murmured. “Less of the world is going round and round. I’m an effing bonk to let it go so long. Just toss me my bag and I’ll do fine.”

  His strange language returning to him was a bad sign. As she laid the bag next to him, she tried to hold back the tears but couldn’t, for she understood Jas would likely lose his arm or even die. An uncontrolled sob escaped.

  “It will be fine,” Jas insisted. “Come on, Miss Wickman, cheer up.”

  Shame filled her. That he had to encourage her when he was in such great need! She thrust her fingernails into her palm to drive off the tears and panic.

  “What shall I do? I can do anything you may require.”

  Another shiver of horrible fear seized her.

  She might have to amputate his arm. She had seen enough of putrescence to know that the poison in his wound could kill quickly. The wave of horror threatened to overwhelm her. She felt sick. When would the misery end?

  Stop, she silently ordered herself. He needed her strong, not mewling in self-pity.

  “Jas. I wish I knew better how to help you. Can you tell me…? What should I do?”

  “You could find a good source of water, I suppose.”

  Yes. He had a fever and would need more than the lukewarm liquid they carried. She gathered all of their flasks and ran down the hill.

  Almost immediately after Eliza disappeared, Jazz heard footsteps and a soft voice sounded in his ear. “You keep her close, don’t you?” Steele again.